Four new species are described: Crania indonesiensis,
Sphenarina ezogremena, Septicollarina hemiechinata,
and Phaneropora galatheae, the last two being the
types of new genera. Phaneropora has become the
type genus of a new family, Phaneroporidae, to
which the deep-sea genus Leptothyrella of formerly
uncertain systematic position has also been referred.
The new family shows a good example of homeomorphy
with a rhynchonelloid deep-sea family
Cryptoporidae.
The morphology the of crura of Rhynchonella
doederleini has been restudied, and the species has
been made the type of a new genus, Acanthobasiliola,
and transferred to the family Basiliolidae, where it
forms the new subfamily Acanthobasilioninae.
The western Pacific species Grammetaria bartschi,
Gryphus davidsoni, Terebratulina reevi, ?T. callinome,
Campages furcgera and Jolonica hedleyi have been
found in the Indian Ocean (south of Bali) for the first
time, but all these occurrences are represented by
empty shells. A new pattern of the geographical distribution,
an "Atlantic-Southern Ocean pattern", is
described for Cryptopora gnomon. This pattern and
the "Pacific-Southern Ocean pattern" of distribution
of another brachiopod deep-sea species, Abyssothyris
wyvilei, seem to indicate different centres of origin for
these deep-sea species. The rising of deep-sea fauna
at the Malayan Archipelago and at the West Indies,
as shown by the distribution of Pelagodiscus atlanticus,
can be considered as evidence that the tropical
shallow-water fauna penetrates to the abyss at least in
these two regions of the world ocean.
Two ancient elements have been recorded: 1) a
new species of Sphenarina which has previously been
known only as a Pliocene fossil from the Mediterranean
region; 2) Septicollarina hemiechinata, n. gen.,
n. sp., which has some similarity to the Triassic genus
Aulacothyropsis from the Alps, the Balkans, Crimea,
the Caucasus and the Pamirs. Therefore the recent
brachiopod fauna of the continental slopes of the
western Pacific reveals a relationship to the fauna of
the ancient Tethys Sea.
