Semicassis Granulata - Taxonomy

Taxonomy

This species was originally named Buccinum granulatum and described by the Austrian scientist Ignaz von Born in 1778. Since the original description, this taxon was recombined numerous times into different genera and subgenera. Nearly a century after Born's description, in 1877, the Swedish naturalist Otto Andreas Lowson Mörch proposed a new combination and transferred this taxon to the genus Cassis and subgenus Semicassis. In 1944, the American malacologist William James Clench recombined the species as Phalium (Semicassis) granulatum, and five years later the Brazilian naturalist Frederico Lange de Morretes recombined it as Semicassis granulatum. Weaver reallocated it in the subgenus Tylocassis in 1962, though Robert Tucker Abbott would recombine it as Phalium (Tylocassis) granulatum six years later. Miller recombined it as Phalim granulatum in 1983, Kreipl recombined it as Semicassis (Semicassis) granulata in 1997. The currently accepted combination, Semicassis granulata, was proposed by Alan Beu based on paleontological data.

A taxon which in the past was considered to be merely a completely smooth and glossy variety of this species was given the name cicatricosa by Johann Friedrich Gmelin in 1791. This taxon is now recognized as Semicassis cicatricosa, a separate species. The shell form of Semicassis granulata that has nodules on the shoulder was named peristephes by Pilsbry & Mcgintyi, 1939; forms however have no taxonomic significance. A similar-looking taxon from the Mediterranean Sea was named by Gmelin in 1791. This is now known as the subspecies Semicassis granulata undulata. This subspecies has been mistakenly reported from the Western Atlantic, but does not occur there. Overall there has been some confusion, especially in the popular literature, about which name should be applied to which of these two taxa.