Complete fossil specimens are known from the famous Early Eocene-aged Monte Bolca site of Italy.

[3][4] It closely resembles and may be related to the extinct species S. natgeosoc from the Bartonian of North Caucasus, Russia.

[5] It was first erroneously identified in 1796 by Giovanni Serafino Volta as a fossil specimen of the extant "Scomber pelagicus" (now synonymized with the modern mahi-mahi).

In 1834, it was described by Louis Agassiz as Lichia prisca, who considered it an extinct relative of the modern leerfish.

It was moved to Seriola by Johann Jakob Heckel in 1854.