Acanthodaphne Bonfitto & Morassi, 2006

Morassi, M. & Bonfitto, A., 2010, New raphitomine gastropods (Gastropoda: Conidae: Raphitominae) from the South-West Pacific, Zootaxa 2526, pp. 54-68 : 62

Genus Acanthodaphne Bonfitto & Morassi, 2006

Type species: Acanthodaphne sabellii Bonfitto & Morassi, 2006

Remarks: The genus Acanthodaphne was erected to allocate the Recent Acanthodaphne sabellii Bonfitto & Morassi, 2006 from the Gulf of Aden and Pleurotomella abbreviata Schepman, 1913 from Indonesia. Puha pusula Laws, 1947 , from the Early Miocene of New Zealand, is the earliest known member of the genus. A fourth species is Pseudoinquisitor ? cf. P.? pulchra ( Schepman, 1913) reported by MacNeil (1960) from the Middle Miocene of Okinawa ( Japan), which in shell outline and ornamentation most closely resembles other members of Acanthodaphne . However, assignment of P.? pulchra to Acanthodaphne is a bit speculative because the protoconch is unknown. Acanthodaphne species superficially resemble members of Buccinaria Kittl, 1887 and Gymnobela Verrill, 1884 but are much smaller. Acanthodaphne further differs from Buccinaria in features of the anal sinus (moderately deep vs very weak) and from Gymnobela in having stronger axial sculpture, reduced number of spiral elements and a well developed subsutural fold. Two features distinguish Acanthodaphne from Acamptodaphne . These are the absence of collabral ornamentation of dense, rough collabral growth lines on shell surface, particularly evident on sutural ramp, (compare figs. 1H, 1Q with 2K, 3C) and the reduced spiral sculpture.

Acanthodaphne species are very similar to each other indicating that in this genus shell characters have remained remarkably stable over a period of at least 20 my.