A large specimen (550 mm TL) of the longfinned bullseye Cookeolus japonicus (Cuvier, 1829) was caught in June 2011 by an otter trawl off Civitavecchia (Rome), Central Tyrrhenian Sea. It represented the first record of this pantropical monotypic genus in the Mediterranean and also the northernmost record in the FNAM area for the family Priacanthidae. The fish is preserved in the ichthyological collection of the Natural History Museum in Genoa, Italy.