Researchers Have Named a Prehistoric Crocodile After Motörhead’s Lemmy

Dinosaurs rock. Almost, but not quite, as hard as ascended heavy metal god, Lemmy Kilmister. So when researchers recently had to give a name to a fearsome prehistoric crocodile, the late Motörhead frontman seemed as fitting an inspiration as any.

According to a release from London’s Natural History Museum, the creature’s bones were actually dug up in the early 20th century, but scientists recently reclassified them as a separate species of crocodile that would have lived about 164 million years ago. The scientists dubbed the new variety of giant crocodile the Lemmysuchus, in honor of the baddest bassist to ever live.

Described as “one of the nastiest sea creatures to have ever inhabited the Earth” by the museum’s curator, Lorna Steel, the Lemmysuchus would have measured almost 20 feet long, thanks in part to long, wicked-looking jaws.*

Lemmy died in 2015, and now his name lives on not only in his bone-shaking music, but in the bones of a terrifying monster. Probably just as he’d like it.

*Correction: Previously we mistakenly listed the length of the skull as 20 feet. This has been corrected to being the length of the whole animal.