180 SPEL^EODISCUS. 



Genus SPEL^ODISCUS Brusina. 



Spelceodiscus Brusina, Mittheil. des naturwissenschaft- 

 lichen Vereines fiir Steiermark, Jahrg. 1885 (1886), p. 37, 

 monotypic, for 8. hauffeni. 



Aspasita Westerlund, Fauna Palaarct. Reg. Binnenconch., 

 i, 1889, pp. 18, 26; monotypic, for "sp. 75" = H. triaria. 



Helix, Gonostoma and Trigonostoma of various authors. 



The shell is openly umbilicate, depressed, being helieoid, 

 much wider than high, of 4^-6^ convex, closely coiled, 

 ribbed whorls. The aperture is strongly oblique, triangular 

 or trilobed; the peristome is narrowly reflected or expanded 

 except at the sinulus, below which the outer lip is calloused, 

 toothed or bent in. Teeth are sometimes present also on the 

 basal and parietal margins. 



Type A. hauffeni. Distribution, Carpathian mountain sys- 

 tem in Transylvania and the Banat, northward to the High 

 Tatra, southwest to Albania. 



This group of little Heliciform snails has been associated 

 with the Helieodontas until recently. Rossmaessler was struck 

 by the resemblance of H. triaria to Pagodulina pagodula in 

 texture, sculpture and shape of mouth, but P. Hesse was the 

 first to show that one of them, 8. triaria, has Pupillid repro- 

 ductive organs. He states that the penis has an appendix 

 with long flagellum and a bifid penial retractor, one branch 

 inserted on the appendix, the other on the penis (Nachrbl. D. 

 M. Ges., no. 47, 1915, p. 58). 



Clessin and others have questioned the specific distinctness 

 of the several Transsylvanian forms of this genus, but Kima- 

 kowicz, who handled more of these shells than any other 

 author, states that the species show no intergradation. They 

 appear to me quite distinct with the exception of var. tatrica 

 Hazay, which I have not seen, and which has not been dis- 

 criminated from A. triadis Kim. All of the species vary- 

 rather widely in the height of the spire. 



Kimakowicz states that though the ranges of A. trinodis 

 and A. triadis partly overlap, not more than one species of 

 the genus has ever been found in one place. 



Sturany and Wagner have shown that Helix hauffeni 



