50 CALCAREOUS ALGAE OF THE MIDDLE EAST 



Remarks. Pia's type-material was from the Austrian Middle Eocene ; the 

 species also occurs in the Middle Eocene of Egypt and Syria (Pfender 1940), Iraq 

 (Sulemania district), and South Oman (Jebel Tanamir). The Middle Eastern 

 Palaeocene-Lower Eocene examples listed above correspond in structure to the type 

 material, but reach a larger size in many if not all examples. External diameters 

 quoted by Pia and Pfender, for example, are 0-26-0-34 mm. and 0-35-0-45 mm 

 respectively, whilst the older Iraqi material described above may attain a corres- 

 ponding dimension of 0-6 mm. 



Although F. diplopora is represented fossil by stout calcareous tubes, the structures 

 preserved afford but an imperfect record of those of the living plant. The larger 

 examples are no better than the smaller in this respect. All indicate a very short 

 primary branch and two secondaries : presumably these latter, which are seen to 

 expand as they reach the outer edge of the zone of calcification, branched further into 

 a spray of uncalcified tertiary branchlets : there is no evidence at all of the sporangia. 

 The relationships of the genus remain doubtful. 



Genus GRIPHOPORELLA Pia 1915 



Diagnosis. Very thin-walled cylindrical, club or ovoid shaped dasyclad calcifi- 

 cations, with numerous simple perforations ; so thin-walled that the perforation- 

 structures are insufficient for elucidation of the branch-structure. 



Remarks. Griphoporella is an inclusive name for those dasyclads whose calcifica- 

 tion was confined to a thin hood-like sheet which affords no clue to the detailed 

 branch-structure, size of stem-cell, etc. of the original plant. The species referred 

 to it range from Triassic to Palaeocene and may be quite unrelated phylogenetically ; 

 see especially under G. arabica below. 



Griphoporella cf. perjoratissima Carozzi 



(PI. 12, fig. 4) 



I 955t > Griphoporella perjoratissima Carozzi : 203, text-fig. ia-d. 

 i960 Griphoporella perjoratissima Carozzi ; Elliott : 223. 



Description. See under remarks. 



Horizon. Top Jurassic and bottom Cretaceous of Europe and Middle East. 



Material. Fragments from the subsurface Upper Jurassic Najmah Formation 

 of Kirkuk Well no. 117, Iraq ; in Arabia, from top Jurassic and bottom Cretaceous 

 levels at Haushi, Southern Oman, and from the Lower Cretaceous of Burun, Wady 

 Hiru Basin, Hadhramaut. 



Remarks. The material listed above is extremely fragmentary, but is of a thin- 

 walled dasyclad, circular in cross-section, and showing very many simple pores. It 

 is similar in age-occurrence to Carozzi's G. perjoratissima (Portlandian-Berriasian) , 

 and has a similar appearance in random cut to the type-figures (Carozzi 1955b, fig. 

 ia). The pores are 0-030-0-040 mm. in diameter, and about 0-020 mm. apart. This 

 is larger than in G. perjoratissima (0-015-0-019 mm. diameter set 0-009-0-012 apart), 



