squaloraja

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A genus of fossil chimæras or selachian fishes of the order Holocephali, having a depressed or elongated trunk, the head produced in a long, slender snout on which there is a prehensile spine in the males, tapering tail, and calcified vertebral rings. Specimens of S. polyspondyla occur as nearly complete skeletons in the Lower Lias of Lyme-Regis, England.