"The Finback" (Balaenoptera velifera, Cope) from Charles Melville Scammon's Marine Mammals of the North-western coast of North America (1874)

Description Balaenoptera physalus
Date 1872
Source Natural history of the cetaceans and other marine mammals of the western coast of North America http://openlibrary.org/books/OL24230767M/Natural_history_of_the_cetaceans_and_other_marine_mammals_of_the_western_coast_of_North_America
Author Unknown
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balaenoptera_physalus1.jpg

The fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus), also called the finback whale, razorback, or common rorqual, is a marine mammal belonging to the suborder of baleen whales. It is the second-largest animal after the blue whale. The largest reportedly grow to 27.3 m long with a maximum confirmed length of 25.9 m, a maximum recorded weight of nearly 74 tonnes and a maximum estimated weight of around 114 tonnes. American naturalist Roy Chapman Andrews called the fin whale "the greyhound of the sea... for its beautiful, slender body is built like a racing yacht and the animal can surpass the speed of the fastest ocean steamship." Order: Artiodactyla, Infraorder: Cetacea, Family: Balaenopteridae, Genus: Balaenoptera, Species: Balaenoptera physalus (Linnaeus, 1758).
Synonyms:
Balaena boops L., 1758
B. antiquorum Fischer, 1829
B. quoyi Fischer, 1829
B. musculus Companyo, 1830
Balaenoptera rorqual Lacép., 1804
B. gibbar Lacép., 1804
B. mediterraneensis Lesson, 1828
B. jubartes Dewhurst, 1834
B. australis Gray, 1846
B. patachonicus Burmeister, 1865
B. velifera Cope, 1869
Physalis vulgaris Fleming, 1828
Rorqualus musculus F. Cuvier, 1836
Pterobalaena communis Van Beneden, 1857