The Marginellidae Fleming and the Cystiscidae Stimpson, herein collectively referred to as marginelliform gastropods, are convergent families of thermophilic marine gastropods. Shallow-water marginelliform gastropods are found in the Ibero-Moroccan Gulf and Mediterranean, diversity rapidly increasing towards tropical West Africa. Surprisingly, in the tropical and subtropical European Miocene fossil record, marginelliform genera of tropical affinity such as Persicula Schumacher and Prunum Herrmannsen, occurring today in West Africa, are altogether missing. Others, such as Marginella Lamarck, are present only in the southwestern Iberian and Mediterranean Neogene record. This work describes the marginelliform gastropods from the Atlantic Iberian Neogene. Ten species are recorded, of which three are new, Persicula mikhailovae n. sp., Gibberula costae n. sp., and Gibberula brebioni n. sp. This study shows that Gibberula Swainson and Volvarina Hinds have been present in Europe since the Eocene. Marginella may have originated in southern Africa and migrated north to Europe in the Miocene, never extending further north than west central Portugal. Persicula and Prunum probably originated in the Caribbean and migrated east during the Pliocene, following closure of the Central American Seaway. The colonization of the Pliocene European Atlantic coast by gastropods of these genera was selective, only where high sea-water temperature and high productivity were combined. These findings suggest that post-Messinian recolonization of the Mediterranean during the Pliocene was a complex process, involving colonization by groups originating in various regions of the Atlantic, including Europe, Africa and the Americas.

Questo lavoro presenta una panoramica sui siti ad orme di dinosauro scoperti negli ultimi anni in Puglia. Sono noti 17 siti, in 11 località (tra i quali il sito di Altamura, quasi unico al mondo), in depositi di età compresa fra il Giurassico superiore ed il Cretaceo terminale. Di questi siti, solo due sono stati resi fruibili al pubblico, sebbene fuori dal contesto stratigrafico originario. Con il suo numero di siti ad orme di dinosauro, certamente destinati ad aumentare, la Puglia si sta rivelando come un territorio unico in Italia. Occorrono interventi coordinati, risorse e ricerca, al fine di proteggere e sfruttare questi siti come una vera e propria risorsa territoriale.

Marginelliforms are an informal group of marine gastropods including two families: Marginellidae Fleming, 1828 and Cystiscidae Stimpson, 1865. They are convergent families, mainly distributed in warm to warm-temperate waters, particularly difficult to be identified at species level, because of the their smooth, featureless shell. The present-day Mediterranean hosts a fairly diverse marginelliform fauna, but the genera with stronger tropical affinity, such as Marginella Lamarck, 1799, are missing since the Early-Middle Pliocene. Gallina is a fossiliferous locality on the Calabrian side of the Messina Strait. Its rich fossil fauna was studied by Seguenza (1879), who reported hundreds of species, mainly molluscs. He also remarked the unusual character of this “Astian” deposit as “facies misto”, as its rich assemblage consists of a mixture of shallow- and deep-water species. For this locality, Seguenza reported six species of marginelliforms. A small, poorly exposed outcrop, was recently discovered near Gallina. The outcrop contains a richly fossiliferous bed, 20 cm thick, consisting of clayey sands (level B), whose fauna corresponds to that studied by Seguenza. It overlays a clayey sandy bed with the Boreal Guest Pseudamussium septemradiatum (level A), and is overlaid by a poorly fossiliferous silty-sandy bed (level C). The nannoplankton assemblage from level A points to the large Gephyrocapsa Zone, while the assemblage from level C is indicative of the small Gephyrocapsa Zone (Early Pleistocene). The nannoplankton assemblage from the richly fossiliferous level B turned out to be totally reworked. All the three levels, particulalry the intermediate one (B), are interpreted as formed via gravitative flows. The marginelliform fauna from the “Seguenza level” (B) consists of some specie of the genus Granulina Jousseaume, 1888, two species of Gibberula Swainson, 1840 and one species of Marginella. One of these species corresponds to Marginella ovulaeformis Seguenza, 1879, described from Gallina. It seems a valid species, as Granulina ovulaeformis (Seguenza), but further studies are needed. The occurrence of a Marginella species at Gallina was quite unexpected, as none of the species reported by Seguenza can be actually referred to such a genus (widely used in the past literature). Furthermore, the species is relatively large (ca 10 mm in shell height) and fairly frequent in the assemblage. The abundant material (about 70 shells) is well preserved and reworking from older sediments is excluded. Most probably, it is an undescribed species, markedly different from the large sized M. aurisleporis (Brocchi, 1814), the last representative of Marginella in the Mediterranean Pliocene. It is worth remarking that several species of Marginella were reported from the Early-Middle Pliocene of Estepona, near the Gibraltar Strait (Landau et al., 2006). The Marginella species from Gallina testifies the local survival of this thermofilic genus through the Early Pleistocene in a Mediterranean “sanctuary”. Indeed, since the Pleistocene at least, the Messina Strait accommodates a high abundance and diversity of species, with many endemisms and primarily Atlantic species forming rich populations.

The species known as Nemocardium striatulum (Brocchi, 1814) is based on a misidentification. Recently, a replacement name was proposed for it, Nemocardium italicum La Perna & D'Abramo, 2011, but the finding of an older valid synonym, Cardium textum Bronn, 1831, demands a nomenclatural update. The correct species' name is Nemocardium textum (Bronn, 1831).

Akardita n. gen. is described for a small Pliocene to Recent group of carditids. The type species is Cardita subrevoluta de Stefani, 1888, from the lower Pliocene of Italy. The new genus includes Akardita iberica n. sp., from the lower Pliocene of southern Spain, and Cardita (Venericardia) monodi Nicklès, 1953, an extant species from West Africa. A few additional Neogene species from Europe could turn out to be representatives of the new genus, whose disappearance from European seas seems to be related to an increasing cooling trend during the Neogene–Pleistocene interval. Because of the confused status of carditid taxonomy, about which some observations are reported in the present work, it is not possible to assign the new genus to any of the traditional subfamilies.

Three Acanthocardia species, namely A. paucicostata (Sowerby 1841), A. bianconiana (Cocconi 1873) and a new species herein described are particularly similar to each other, sharing some shell characters: shell relatively thin-walled, compared with the congeners, tending to be antero-posteriorly elongate, bearing a low number of radial ribs (15-18). A. paucicostata is an extant species with a stratigraphic distribution ranging back to the Late Miocene at least. A. bianconiana, regarded as a variety or subspecies of A. paucicostata in the past literature, had a Plio-Pleistocene Mediterranean distribution. The new species, A. brunettii n.sp., the smallest Acanthocardia species so far known and with an unusually elongate shape, also had a Plio-Pleistocene distribution. There are evidences that the paucicostata group also had representatives in the Miocene, either in the paleo-Mediterranean and the the Paratethys.

Europicardium Popov, 1977 was introduced for some Cenozoic cardiids from Europe (Schneider, 2002). In most literature, even in the most recent, this genus has been overlooked or confused with Trachycardium Mörch, 1853, which is a distinct genus living in the tropical American waters. The best known Europicardium species is E. multicostatum (Brocchi, 1814), type species. The present work, though at a preliminary stage, tries to review the fossil species of Europicardium, and to outline the palaeogeography of the genus. According to Schneider (2002), Europicardium includes four Neogene species of Europe and North Africa: E. multicostatum (Brocchi, 1814), E. polycolpatum (Cossmann & Peyrot, 1911), E. pseudomulticostatum (Zhizhchenko, 1934) and E. badeniense (Kókay, 1996). Three living species are known from the tropical West Africa, E. caparti (Nickles, 1955) being the best known. The present revision allowed the distribution of E. multicostatum to be better defined, i.e. Pliocene to Early Pleistocene of the circum-Mediterranean area, excluding the older records reported in literature, and to put E. polycolpatum in synonymy with E. miorotundata (Sacco, 1899), originally described as a Miocene variety of Trachycardium multicostatum. It is known from the Early Miocene of Aquitaine, Middle Miocene of Paratetheys and paleo-Mediterranean. E. pseudomulticostatum is from the Middle Miocene of Crimea, Ciscaucasia and Transcaucasia (Eastern Paratethys), whereas E. badeniense is from the Middle Miocene of Hungary (Central Paratethys). Another Paratethyan species, from the Vienna basin, misidentified as multicostatum since Hoernes (1862), proved to be distinct and will be described as new. Other possible distinct species are the varieties mioangulata and miocaudata, both described by Sacco (1899) on scarce and fragmentary material from the Miocene of the Turin Hill. The oldest records of Europicardium are from the Early Miocene of the Aquitaine basin. This supports Schneider's (2002) hypothesis of strong relations with Loxocardium Cossmann, 1886, from the Paris basin. From the Aquitaine basin, Europicardium widely spred into the paleo-Mediterranean and Paratehtys, reaching a remarkable diversity in the Middle Miocene, probably thanks to the Middle Miocene Climate Optimum. Since the closure of Paratethys and the Pliocene climate deterioration, Europicardium became confined to the Mediterranean, with E. multicostatum, until the Early Pleistocene. Finally, the strong Quaternary climate changes led the genus to withdraw to southern areas, in the tropical waters of Western Africa.

Procardium gen. nov. is proposed for a group of early Miocene to Recent large cardiids in the subfamily Cardiinae. The type species is Cardium indicum, the only living representative, previously assigned to the genus Cardium. It is a mainly West African species, with a very limited occurrence in the westernmost Mediterranean. Procardium gen. nov. and Cardium differ markedly with regard to shell characters and have distinct evolutionary and biogeographic histories. Six species, in the early Miocene to Pleistocene range, and one Recent species are assigned to the new genus: Procardium magnei sp. nov., P. jansseni sp. nov., P. danubianum, P. kunstleri, P. avisanense, P. diluvianum, and P. indicum. During the Miocene, Procardium gen. nov. had a wide distribution in Europe, including the Proto-Mediterranean Sea, Western and Central Paratethys and NE Atlantic, with a maximum diversity during the Langhian and Serravallian. Its palaeobiogeographic history was strongly controlled by climate. During the Langhian stage, warm conditions allowed the genus to reach its highest latitude, ca. 54° N, in the southern North Sea Basin. With cooling, its latitudinal range gradually retreated southward, becoming mainly Mediterranean in the Pliocene–Pleistocene, and West African at present.