PORITES, 5 
points or teeth did not, apparently, refer to the pali of Porites, but rather to the vertical rows 
of points which he saw representing the septa in the eight Montipore included in his list of 
nineteen species, only one or two being, perhaps, true Porites, viz. the enigmatical P. pwnctata 
Ehr. (see below P. miilleri), and one of his varieties (see P. nodifera K1z.). 
Ehrenberg’s classification, based solely upon the method of budding, explains his having 
merged Montipora into Porites, an error only partially rectified by Milne-Edwards and Haime 
(see this Catalogue Vol. III. pp. 4, 5). 
In 1848, Dana’s “ Zoophytes” appeared, and the genus Porites was united with Goniopora, 
the two forming the family Poritide. For a description of the structure and position of this 
family, see our Vol. IV., pp. 27, 28. Porites, according to Dana, differed from Gontopora in 
having smaller calicles, with only 12 septa. 
Porites was further characterised by the circle of 5-6 pali round a central point or “ pore,” 
often surrounded by an outer ring of granules, combinations of one inner and two outer, 
frequently forming V-shaped pali. Twenty-four species occur in Dana’s list, divided primarily 
according to. growth form: 1. Ramose, (a) with branches compressed, not plicate, () with 
branches plicate. 2. Glomerate. 3. Thin encrusting. These were again divided into those 
with calicles (a) excavate, (5) superficial. 
In 1851, Milne-Edwards and Haime* published their monograph of the Poritidz, and, 
as described in Vol. IV., p. 4, diagnosed the family and the genus on an entirely false principle. 
The genus Porites itself is well, though insufficiently, described, and an excellent plate is 
given with enlarged figures to show “the structure of Porites” and drawn from a few of the 
more crowded branches of one of the original specimens of “P. furcata” of Lamarck, still 
preserved in the Paris Museum. ‘The ring of “5-6, sometimes more” pali, is noted, with the 
observation that they seem hardly distinguishable from the septa (“cloisons. . . peu distinctes 
des palis”), The central columellar tubercle is also mentioned. For Milne-Edwards (“ Les 
Coralliaires” iii. (1860) p. 173) the genus consisted of twenty-seven recent and one fossil 
“species.” They are divided primarily according to growth-form. Other lines of division 
were based upon the development of the columella and the thickness of the walls, The four 
last “ species,” taken from Dana, are marked as doubtful members of the genus. They were 
transferred to a new genus, Synarwa, by Dr. Verrill (see below, p. 9). 
In 1860, Duchassaing and Michelottit described new specimens from the West Indies, 
while in a supplement (1864) they classified the specimens, dividing them into three genera: 
(1) Porites, with pali, and most often ramose (“sepissime ramose”); (2) Neoporites, with 
calicles deep and pali suppressed; (3) Cosmoporites, differing only in growth-form from 
Neoporites, being “repentes incrustantes,” instead of “incrustantes tuberose vel etiam lobatee.” 
These divisions have, as we shall see, found no favour,t and, for reasons which will be found 
below (p. 10), are not accepted in this Catalogue. 
* Ann. Sci. Nat. (3°) xvi. p. 21. 
+ Mém. sur les Cor. des Antilles, Turin, p. 82. 
f Pourtales, in his notice on Florida reef corals, thought Neoporites a good sub-genus. 
