Derived from an old diminutive of MARTIN. MAXWELL Scottish. From a place name meaning Mack's stream, from the name Mack, a short form of the Scandinavian name MAGNUS, combined with Old English wella stream ...
For the ray-finned fish known as common dolphin, see Mahi-mahi. The common dolphin is the name given to two species (and possibly a third) of dolphin making up the genus Delphinus. Prior to the mid-1990s, most taxonomists only recognised one species in this genus, the common dolphin Delphinus delphis.
Dolphins are a widely distributed and diverse group of aquatic mammals. They are an informal grouping within the order Cetacea, excluding whales and porpoises, so to zoologists the grouping is paraphyletic. The dolphins comprise the extant families Delphinidae, Platanistidae, Iniidae, and Pontoporiidae, and the extinct Lipotidae. There are 40 extant species of dolphins. Dolphins, alongside other cetaceans, belong to the clade Cetartiodactyla with even-toed ungulates. Cetaceans' closest living re