Bandfishes are a family, Cepolidae, of perciform fishes. They are native to the Atlantic seaboard of Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 and the West Pacific, including New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

. They dig burrows in sandy or muddy seabed and eat zooplankton

Zooplankton

Zooplankton are heterotrophic plankton. Plankton are organisms drifting in oceans, seas, and bodies of fresh water. The word "zooplankton" is derived from the Greek zoon , meaning "animal", and , meaning "wanderer" or "drifter"...

.

The oldest recipe by a named author involves the preparation of a bandfish. The original recipe book, by Mithaecus

Mithaecus

Mithaecus was a cook and cookbook author of the late 5th century BC. A Greek-speaking native of Sicily at a time when the island was rich and highly civilized, Mithaecus is credited with having brought knowledge of Sicilian gastronomy to Greece...

, is now lost, but the recipe itself survives thanks to being quoted in the Deipnosophistae

Deipnosophistae

The Deipnosophistae may be translated as The Banquet of the Learned or Philosophers at Dinner or The Gastronomers...

.

Species

There are 23 species in five genera, according to FishBase:

• Genus Acanthocepola
  • Yellow-spotted bandfish, Acanthocepola abbreviata (Valenciennes
    Achille Valenciennes
    Achille Valenciennes was a French zoologist.Valenciennes was born in Paris, and studied under Georges Cuvier. Valenciennes' study of parasitic worms in humans made an important contribution to the study of parasitology...
    
    , 1835)
  • Indian bandfish, Acanthocepola indica (Day, 1888)
  • Red-spotted bandfish, Acanthocepola krusensternii (Temminck & Schlegel, 1845)
  • Black-spot bandfish, Acanthocepola limbata (Valenciennes, 1835)
• Genus Cepola
  Cepola
  Cepola is a genus of marine fish in the bandfish family Cepolidae. The name red bandfish is applied to all members of this genus, but particularly C. macrophthalma, and generally not C...
  
  
  • Cepola australis Ogilby
    William Ogilby
    William Ogilby was an Irish barrister and naturalist.Ogilby was honorary secretary of the Zoological Society of London from 1839 to 1846....
    
    , 1899
  • Cepola haastii (Hector
    James Hector
    Sir James Hector was a Scottish geologist, naturalist, and surgeon who accompanied the Palliser Expedition as a surgeon and geologist...
    
    , 1881)
  • Cepola macrophthalma
    Cepola macrophthalma
    Cepola macrophthalma is a fish of the of the bandfish family Cepolidae. It is found in the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean from Senegal north to Norway...
    
    (Linnaeus
    Carolus Linnaeus
    Carl Linnaeus , also known after his ennoblement as , was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who laid the foundations for the modern scheme of binomial nomenclature. He is known as the father of modern taxonomy, and is also considered one of the fathers of modern ecology...
    
    , 1758)
  • Cepola pauciradiata
    Cepola pauciradiata
    Cepola pauciradiata is a species of bandfish in the family Cepolidae. It is found on the Atlantic coast of Africa from Mauritiana to Angola, and off the coast of the Cape Verde islands. It is found on the ocean bottom at depths from . The maximum length recorded for this species is...
    
    Cadenat, 1950
  • Cepola schlegelii Bleeker
    Pieter Bleeker
    Pieter Bleeker was a Dutch medical doctor and ichthyologist, famous for his work on the fishes of East Asia – Atlas Ichthyologique des Orientales Neerlandaises – which was published 1862–1877....
    
    , 1854
• Genus Owstonia
  • Owstonia dorypterus (Fowler, 1934)
  • Owstonia grammodon (Fowler, 1934)
  • Owstonia maccullochi Whitley, 1934
  • Owstonia macrophthalmus (Fourmanoir, 1985)
  • Owstonia nigromarginatus (Fourmanoir, 1985)
  • Owstonia pectinifer (Myers, 1939)
  • Owstonia sarmiento Liao, Reyes & Shao, 2009
  • Owstonia simoterus (Smith, 1968)
  • Owstonia tosaensis Kamohara, 1934
  • Owstonia totomiensis Tanaka, 1908
  • Owstonia weberi (Gilchrist, 1922)
• Genus Pseudocepola
  • Pseudocepola taeniosoma Kamohara, 1935
• Genus Sphenanthias
  • Sphenanthias sibogae Weber, 1913