Holotype of Aphanius bicorbensis Gaudant 2010

Gender roles

Gender and space

Gender and history

This is a holotype of the Aphanius bicorbensis Gaudant 2010, a prehistoric fish that lived ten million years ago. It belongs to the family Cyprinodontidae, and is also known as the toothcarp. It was discovered in 2010 in the outcropping of the salt paleolake in Bicorp (Valencia). The species lived during the Late Miocene sub-epoch. This wetland predator may be a distant ancestor of today’s Spanish toothcarp, or Spanish pupfish, found in the Albufera freshwater lagoon in Valencia. This specimen belongs to the Scientific Collection housed in the Museu de la Universitat de València d’Història Natural. Paleontology is the study of fossils, and it has always been regarded as a male profession because fieldwork, excavations and scientific debates were not considered a woman’s work. However, at the beginning of the 19th century Mary Anning was the first female paleontologist to be recognized as such. She had been rejected in her time (and is even today unfairly considered) because she was a woman from a poor family who was intruding upon a male profession.