Cincinnetina, a new Late Ordovician dalmanellid brachiopod from the Cincinnati type area, USA: implications for the evolution and palaeogeography of the epicontinental fauna of Laurentia.

The most common forms of Late Ordovician dalmanellid brachiopods from the Cincinnatian type area, previously treated as either Dalmanella or Onniella, are assigned to Cincinnetina gen. nov. The new genus differs from Dalmanella and Onniella in having a consistently developed primary medial costa in the dorsal valve, a larger cardinal process that tends to develop a trilobed myophore, strongly differentiated fine and coarse punctae, and sparse aditicules. Cincinnetina can be distinguished from the closely related Paucicrura and Diceromyonia in its smaller trilobed cardinal process (when developed) that does not have a dominant medial lobe and does not extend into the delthyrial cavity of the ventral valve. Globally, Dalmanella and Onniella occur most commonly in deposits of relatively deep- or cool-water palaeoecological settings, whereas in North America, Cincinnetina, Paucicrura and Diceromyonia are found mainly in carbonate-rich deposits in warm-water depositional environments, with Cincinnetina and Paucicrura most common in pericratonic settings and Diceromyonia in palaeoequatorial inland seas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]