CALCAREOUS ALGAE OF THE MIDDLE EAST 15 



DASYCLADACEAE incerta sedis 

 Atractylopsis 

 Furcoporella 

 Griphoporella 



Problematica, possibly dasycladaceae 



Pseudovermiporella (PDASYPORELLEAE) 



Hensonella (PDIPLOPOREAE, as Salpingoporella dinarica) 



Algae, not dasycladaceae 

 Thaumatoporella 



" Epimastopora minima Elliott " (= Tauridium sp.) 

 " Griphoporella arabica Pfender " 

 (= Ovulites maillolensis Massieux). 



III. SYSTEMATIC DESCRIPTIONS 



In the descriptions which follow, the geological ages of all material mentioned are 

 given in terms of local rock-units and standard international stages as far as possible. 

 Every effort has been made to take account of all relevant literature up to the end 

 of 1966. A bibliography of the geology of the Middle East is far outside the scope 

 of the present work, but key publications may be quoted for Iraq, Qatar, Oman and 

 the Hadhramaut from which the vast majority of the specimens were collected. 

 For Iraq, the very detailed Lexique Stratigraphique International, listed in the 

 present bibliography both under Bellen, R. C. van (1959), and under Dunnington, 

 Wetzel & Morton (1959), is invaluable. The Hadhramaut material is similarly 

 covered by Beydoun (1964). A suitable account for the much smaller and simpler 

 Qatar is that by Qatar Petroleum Company, Ltd. (i960). Oman is covered by the 

 general account of Morton (1959), and the detailed local papers of Hudson and 

 collaborators are mentioned where relevant in the present study. 



The regional location of the numerous small localities quoted are best gleaned from 

 these works ; in the present text they are given with the appropriate province or 

 administrative division. The geographical co-ordinates of these localities are 

 listed on p. 109. 



Genus ACICULARIA (d'Archiac) Munier-Chalmas 



Diagnosis. Calcareous spicules, typically elongate-cuneiform, circular or 

 flattened in cross-section, set peripherally with small spherical cavities ; in life part 

 of the fertile whorl of the plant. 



Acicularia was proposed by d'Archiac (1843 : 386) for certain fossil spicules 

 occurring in the Paris Basin Eocene. Referred to different animal groups by various 

 authors, their algal origin was recognized by Munier-Chalmas (1877), and the sub- 

 sequent discovery of a living species confirmed this diagnosis. Munier-Chalmas 

 published little but the bare statements of this and other original discoveries, and 

 the details of his species, and the subgenus Briardina, are to be found in later authors, 

 notably in the classic works of L. and J. Morellet (1913, 1922), and in the paper by 



