Stromboidea

• Rimellidae

  • Rimella fusoides d’Archiac & Haime, 1854

Original description by d’Archiac et Haime, cited after Villalta Comella, 1956. p. 173 [57]:

• “Coquille exactement fusoïde à arètes curvilignes, et composé d’environ 7 tours, peu convexes, séparés par une suture simple, superficielle, le dernier étant égal aux deux tiers de la hauteur totale. Les trois premiers paraissent être lisses, et les suivants son couverts de plis longitudinaux, simples, réguliers, étroites, nombreux, fort rapprochés, et a peine arqués. Sur le dernier ils se prolongent jusqu’au canal, et son traversés, a partier de la moitié inferiéure de la base, par des stries très régulières et d’autant plus serrées qu’elles se rapprochent davantage de l’extrémité inférieure. Ouverture allongée, probablement fort étroite. Bord droit unconnu. Bord gauche largament concave. Hauteur presumée 22 mm, diamètre du dernier tour 7 mm. Il y a de individus qui paraissent atteindre 35 mm sur 9 ou 10.”

Locus typicus: as cited by Cossmann & Pissarro, 1909, p. 48: India “Jhirak“

Stratum typicum: as cited by Cossmann & Pissarro, 1909, p. 48 lower Eocene “uppermost Ranikot (zone 4)”

History and Synonymy

1909

Description by Cossmann & Pissarro, 1909, p. 47:

• “Size less than medium; shape fusiform, rather conoidal; spire turriculated, not very elongated, with obtuse apex, consisting of seven or eight gyrations which are at first feebly convex and smooth, separated by deep sutures, their height equal to two-fifth of their width; at about the penultimate whorl, numerous ribs make their appearance: they are narrow, very close-set, scarcely curvilinear, and the intervals between them are, at first, smooth. Body-whorl occupying nearly two-third of the total height, feebly ventricose, oval at its base, ornamented like the preceding whorl with the addition of very fine spiral striations in the intervals between the axial ribs, best seen in the neighborhood of the aliform expansion, on whose outer surface they expand fanwise; on the base they somewhat abruptly give place to spiral cords crossing the axial folds which persist as far as the neck. Aperture obliquely elongate, rather narrow, terminated posteriorly by a groove and anteriorly by a beak adjacent to an inflated rostrum; outer lip thickened and expanded, with a denticulated crest along its margin, bent in front and to the left of the axis, posteriorly produced up to the apex of the spire which it covers; columella excavated, with a callous margin almost detached, and posteriorly joined on to the opposite lip.”

Comments by Cossmann & Pissarro, 1909, p. 48:

• “Comparison with other species. - D’Archiac and Haime’s figures represent incomplete specimens. It is by means of the principal character mentioned by these authors, the obliteration of the ribs on completely smooth early whorls, that we have been able to refer to this species, the remarkable neotype which we have figured. The elegant lattice of spiral threads observable on the body-whorl of this neotype, is invisible on the other incomplete specimen which, in every other way resembles those figured by d’Archiac and Haime. R. fusoides is easily distinguished from R. fissurella, by its smooth early whorls, its much more crowded ribs, and its spiral striations. Its depressed conoidal shape, its spiral striations, and the serrated crest of its outer lip, distinguish it from R. Prestwichi. We feel inclined to think that R. Jamesoni, d’Archiac and Haime, in a more complete specimen of R. fusoides, in which the ribs only begin to appear on the ventral surface of the body-whorl. There does not seem to be much need of a distinct name for this variety.”

1956

Comments by Villalta Comella, 1956. p. 173 [57]:

• “Nuestro único ejemplar, algo incompleto, parece poderse referir a esta especie, con cuya descriptión concuerdan la mayoría de caracteres; en él observamos que la longitud de la última vuelta es algo menor, pues no alcanza los dos tercios de la longitud total y que toda la superfice de la concha está cubierta por estrías espirales, muy finas y regularmente espaciadas, que se hacen claramente visibles a partir de la mitad anterior de la base (inferior según d’Archiac) donde tienen un aspecto granular al pasar por encima las costillas axiales. Esta especie ha sido citada por Doncieux en el Luteciense inferieur de l’Aude (“Description paléontologique de nummulitique de la Montagne Noir et du Minervois”, p. 39-40). Los ejemplares descritos por d’Archiac, Doncieux y el nuestro, tienen incompleta la boca, lo que hace imposible una atributón genérica exacta; lo que casi puede afirmarse es que no correspondende al género Rimella, pues en ninguno de los ejemplares se observa la típica prolongación del labro la espira.”
• Findspot in España. “San Román de Basa”
• Stratum in España: Eoceno “Luteciense superior y Bartoniense inferior”
• Types: “Colección Villalta, numero 7723” [Museo Instituto Geológico y Miero de España, Barcelona?]

References

• Cossmann, Pissarro & Vredenburg, 1909
• d’Archiac, V. & Haime, J., 1854. Description des animaux fossiles du groupe nummulitique de l’Inde , précédée d'un résumé géologique et d'une monographie des nummulites. Gide et J. Baudry, Paris. Livraison 2, Mollusques, pp. 225–373, pls. 16–36
• Villalta Comella, 1956