The middle Miocene Badenian sediments of the western Central Paratethys are particularly rich in highly diverse associations of gobies, represented by their otoliths. This diversity is caused by significant variations in palaeoenvironmental conditions over short distances. Here we review the rich goby otolith collections from the Carpathian Foredeep in southern Poland and southern Moravia and from the northern Vienna Basin in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. A total of 31 gobiid species are recognised in the Badenian, with six species new to science: Gobius supraspectabilis n. sp., Chromogobius? primigenius n. sp., Odondebuenia agiadiae n. sp., Vanderhorstia prochazkai n. sp., Hesperichthys iugosus n. sp. and Knipowitschia polonica n. sp. The fossil otolith-based genus Hoeseichthys n. gen. is established to account for the deep-water species H. preaclarus (Procházka, 1893) and H. laevis (Weiler, 1942), the latter of which is primarily found in the North Sea Basin. In addition, the rich material now available offers an opportunity to redefine certain species from the area that were described by Procházka between 1893 and 1900. The whereabouts of Procházka’s original material is unknown, with the exception of a few undescribed specimens that were recently discovered and are included in this study. Many of the species described by him have proven enigmatic in taxonomic otolith research, and, unfortunately, some of them cannot be redefined even now and will have to remain nomina dubia until his type specimens are re-discovered or declared lost. This study aims at establishing a baseline for the assessment of the evolution of gobies in the Mediterranean and the Paratethys after the separation of these seas, which were still interconnected during the early Badenian. Our study reveals that all major Atlanto-Mediterranean goby lineages, represented by a number of mostly persistent genera, were present in the Badenian. The first taxa of the Ponto-Caspian goby lineages are unambiguously represented only since the late Badenian. The Badenian of the Central Paratethys also contained a few goby lineages which are now not found around Europe but do exist in the Indo-West Pacific (i.e., the Asterropteryx lineage and the Priolepis lineage). There are indications that the identified genera of the Asterropteryx lineage (Amblyeleotris, Vanderhorstia) may have already lived in commensal association with alpheid shrimps at that time. The Paratethyan events during the middle Miocene are reflected in a moderate faunal change in the gobiid composition from the early Badenian to the late Badenian and a major faunal change following the Badenian- Sarmatian Extinction Event.

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