Tornidae is a family of very small and minute sea snails with an operculum, marine gastropod mollusks in the clade Littorinimorpha. This family used to be known as the Vitrinellidae.[1] Iredale has shown that the family Adeorbidae Monterosato, 1884 should be called Tornidae [2]
Family names cited with two dates (the second one in parentheses) are those ruled by Article 40(2) of ICZN. "If ... a family-group name was replaced before 1961 because of the synonymy of the type genus, the replacement name is to be maintained if it is in prevailing usage. A name maintained by virtue of this Article retains its own author [and date, the first date cited] but takes the priority of the replaced name [the date cited in parentheses, here alluding to Adeorbidae Monterosato, 1884] [1]
The shells of the snails in this family are minute, colorless and glassy.
The paucispiral shell is umbilicated, auriform and depressed. The entire aperture is oblique. The shell has a simple columella, and a rounded, sharp outer lip. The corneous operculum is paucispiral, and has an eccentric nucleus.
The body of the animal differs from species in the family Trochidae by having no cirriform appendages of the foot.[3] The radula is taenioglossate. (Thiele, 1925)
The following subfamilies were recognized in the 2005 taxonomy of Bouchet & Rocroi, but have now become alternate representations:
Genera in the family Tornidae include:
Tornidae is a family of very small and minute sea snails with an operculum, marine gastropod mollusks in the clade Littorinimorpha. This family used to be known as the Vitrinellidae. Iredale has shown that the family Adeorbidae Monterosato, 1884 should be called Tornidae
Family names cited with two dates (the second one in parentheses) are those ruled by Article 40(2) of ICZN. "If ... a family-group name was replaced before 1961 because of the synonymy of the type genus, the replacement name is to be maintained if it is in prevailing usage. A name maintained by virtue of this Article retains its own author [and date, the first date cited] but takes the priority of the replaced name [the date cited in parentheses, here alluding to Adeorbidae Monterosato, 1884]
