NO. 3 ON THE FOSSIL CRIXOID FAMILY CATILLOCKIMDAE 3I 



boniferoiis types. Out of 24 genera of crinoids described by Wanner 

 from Timor which either occur also in Europe or America, or both, 

 or are of types comparable to others which so occur, 1 1 are restricted 

 to the Lower Carboniferous or earlier, 8 range from the Lower to 

 the Upper Carboniferous, 3 are known from the Upper Carbonif- 

 erous only, and 2 from the Permian. From what I have been in- 

 formed in regard to the blastoids. I should expect even a stronger 

 representation of Lower Carboniferous types. ^ 



There are, of course, other crinoid types which have no known 

 representatives elsewhere. 



The stratigraphy of Timor is extremely complicated. Great dis- 

 locations of the sedimentary deposits have taken place, caused, by 

 volcanic action and other earth movements, so that many of the 

 richest fossiliferous strata have become isolated, and their continuity 

 often abruptly disturbed. Professor H. A. Brouwer, of Delft, Hol- 

 land, whose knowledge of the geology of Timor and adjacent islands 

 is most intimate, based upon extensive personal investigations, in- 

 forms me that during the Tertiary mountain-building process the 

 Paleozoic, Mesozoic and older Tertiary rocks were intensely folded 

 and overthrusted, the less resistant layers between the more resistant 

 ones being sometimes entirely squeezed out, while blocks of hard 

 limestone of very different age are frequently found close to each 

 other. This phenomenon is often repeated in the details of a rela- 

 tively thin complex of strata, and the result at many places is a mosaic 

 of rocks of different character and age. Thus it is possible that sedi- 

 ments of different horizons have been thrown together, or so dis- 

 tributed that their relation to one another has been obscured. 



Ninety- five per cent of the genera and at least 80 per cent of the 

 species of crinoids described by Wanner are recorded from a limited 

 area at and near P)asleo and Niki-Niki, which is in the middle part 

 of the Dutch possessions on the island ; and in this relatively small 

 region are found all those types characteristic of widely separated 

 horizons elsewhere. No sufficient data are available to determine 

 whether the intermingling of types as found in the fossils is due to 

 the complicated structure resulting from the dynamic movements 

 above mentioned, or whether it actually occurred in life as the result 

 of faunal developm.ents wholly independent of those occurring in 

 other parts of the earth. 



^ Bather when describing two species of Schlsoblastns from Timor in 1908 

 (Neues Jahrb. f. Min., Bd. XXV, p. 319) stated that until further facts were 

 forthcoming he must " consider these species as of Lower Carboniferous age." 



