Cantabroraphidia marcanoi is known only from one fossil, the
holotype, specimen number ES-07-6, which is housed in the Museo Geominero in
Madrid, Spain. The specimen is composed of an almost entirely complete adult insect of unidentified sex. Preserved in a transparent mass of amber, the specimen is fixed in association with a large amount of plant debris and one adult
dipteran. Despite the amount of debris obscuring portions of the individual, enough details are present and visible to show the specimen was not from a previously described genus. The fossil was recovered from outcrops of the
Las Peñosas Formation in the
Cave of El Soplao near Rábago, part of the Cantabria autonomous community in Northern Spain.
Cantabroraphidia was first studied by group of paleoentomologists led by Ricardo Pérez-de la Fuente of the
University of Barcelona and including Enrique Peñalver, Xavier Delclòs, and André Nel. Their 2010
type description of the new genus and species was published in the French journal
Annales de la Société Entomologique de France. The genus name
Cantabroraphidia was coined by the researchers as a combination of the snakefly genus
Raphidia and "Cantabria" which is in reference the Cantabria autonomous community where the outcrops that produced the fossil are located. The
specific epithet marcanoi is from in honor of Francisco Javier López Marcano as recognition for his efforts to have the El Soplao ambers studied.
Cantabroraphidia marcanoi is one of six described snakefly species found in the Albian deposits of Cantabria, and was the first Raphidiopteran to be described from El Soplao. ==Description==