A new Middle Devonian heterocoral from Spain

Most of the heterocorals described up to now from strata older than Famennian are of doubtful affinities. Numerous specimens of the new genus and new species here described were collected during a sedimentological study of the Santa Lucía Formation in La Pola de Gordon (León province, Cantabrian Mountains, NW Spain). Stellaphyllia luciensis gen. et sp. nov. is characterized by cylindrical coralla, with a diameter of less than 2 mm and more than 2 cm long, having stellate to more or less rounded outer profile. Four to six septa, less frequently seven, are cojoined axially by a short oblique septum. The few tabulae present are steeply arched. The microstructure of the septa and interseptal elements shows thin elongate microlamellae parallel to a median plate which is granular in appearance. The new genus dated to the lower Eifelian age could be important in understanding the early phylogeny and origin of the order Heterocorallia