<i>Papahu</i>-like fossil dolphin from Kaikoura, New Zealand, helps to fill the Early Miocene gap in the history of Odontoceti

An early Miocene dolphin (ZMT 73: partial skull and ear bones) from Kaikoura, New Zealand, is the sister taxon to the previously named Early Miocene <i>Papahu taitapu.</i> The new specimen, although insufficient to justify a new species name, includes an informative squamosal and periotic that help move the <i>Papahu</i> clade from the stem Odontoceti to either the Platanistoidea, or to become the sister taxon to the Ziphiidae+Eurhinodelphinidae+Delphinida. The fossils usefully add to the taxonomic and structural diversity of Cetacea during the important but poorly known Early Miocene.