Murex

Murex is a genus of medium to large sized predatory tropical sea snails. These are carnivorous marine gastropod molluscs in the family Muricidae, commonly called "murexes" or "rock snails".

For other uses, see Murex (disambiguation).

Murex
Temporal range:
Apertural view of the shell of Venus comb murex, Murex pecten, anterior end towards the bottom of the page
Scientific classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
Subclass: Caenogastropoda
Order: Neogastropoda
Family: Muricidae
Subfamily: Muricinae
Genus: Murex
Linnaeus, 1758
Species

See text

Synonyms
  • Acupurpura Jousseaume, 1880
  • Aranea Perry, 1810 (Invalid: junior homonym of Aranea Linnaeus, 1758 [Arachnida])
  • Murex (Murex) Linnaeus, 1758· accepted, alternate representation
  • Murex (Promurex) Ponder & Vokes, 1988· accepted, alternate representation
  • † Muricites Schlotheim, 1820 (Invalid under Art. 20: name established for fossils, formed by adding the suffix -ites to the genus name Murex.)
  • Tubicauda Jousseaume, 1880

The common name murex is still used for many species in the family Muricidae which were originally given the Latin generic name Murex in the past, but have more recently been regrouped into different newer genera.

The word murex was used by Aristotle in reference to these kinds of snails, thus making it one of the oldest classical seashell names still in use by the scientific community.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.