A juvenile Early Carboniferous (Vis an) coelacanth from R senbeck (Rhenish Mountains, Germany) with derived postcranial characters

(1) Rhabdoderma elegans (Newberry, 1856) (‘Coelacanthus watsoni’) from the ‘Namurian’ to ‘Westphalian C’ of the Ruhr Region (Aldinger 1931; Keller 1934; Forey 1981) and from the ‘Namurian A (E1)’ of Rosenhof near Niederhemer, northern Rhenish Mountains, Germany (Horn 1960, pl. 5, fig. 4). This taxon was also documented in the ‘Namurian’ to ‘Westphalian C’ of the British Isles, northern France, Belgium, and the Netherlands, in the ‘Westphalian D’ of Linton, Ohio, and the ‘Stephanian’ of the Ukraine (Forey 1981, 1991). (2) Rhabdoderma tingleyense (Davis, 1884) (‘Coelacanthus mucronatus’) was found in the ‘Westphalian A–C’ of the Ruhr Region, Germany, as well as in the ‘Westphalian’ of the British Isles, northern France, Belgium, and the Netherlands (Keller 1934; Forey 1991). (3) Rhabdoderma stensioei (Aldinger, 1931) (‘Coelacanthus stensi i’) from the ‘Namurian A (E1)’ of Rosenhof near Niederhemer (Aldinger 1931; Keller 1934; Cloutier & Candilier 1995). R. stensioei was also identified from strata of the latest ‘Vis an’ to ‘Namurian A’ of Belgium (Demanet 1938, 1941, 1943; Cloutier & Candilier 1995). (4) Coelacanthus sp. was described by Aldinger (1931) from the ‘Namurian A (E1)’ of Rosenhof near Niederhemer. (5) Additional coelacanths are known from non-German Carboniferous strata of Western and Middle Europe, including Rhabdoderma ?aldingeri MoyThomas, 1937 from the ‘Namurian A’ of Wales, Belgium and Northern France (Moy-Thomas 1937; Cloutier & Forey 1991; Cloutier & Candilier 1995), and R. huxleyi (Traquair, 1881) from the ‘Vis an’ of Scotland (Cloutier & Forey 1991) and probably the ‘Namurian A’ from Belgium and northern France (Cloutier & Candilier 1995).