Hanleya sirenkoi, Dell’Angelo & Sosso & Taviani, 2025

Hanleya sirenkoi sp. nov.

Fig. 48 View FIGURE 48

Type material. Holotype MSNG 62635 View Materials , intermediate valve, width 11.5 (14.4) mm ( Figs 48A–H View FIGURE 48 ).

Type locality. Vallone Catrica , Reggio Calabria ( Calabria, Italy) .

Type stage. Lower Pleistocene .

Etymology. The specific name honors Boris Sirenko (Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia), for his prominent contribution to the study of Recent and fossil chitons.

Material examined. Pleistocene: Italy: type material .

Diagnosis. Intermediate valves broadly rectangular, moderately elevated, carinate, small protruding apex. Tegmentum surface barely visible, granules very close to each other, arranged without pattern, more roundish and a little smaller in LA, oval in CA, each granule with 1–3 megaesthete in central position surrounded by up to 20–25 microaesthetes, all of same size. Articulamentum solid, apophyses wide.

Description. Head and tail valve unknown. Intermediate valves broadly rectangular, moderately elevated (H/W estimated = 0.38), carinate in anterior profile, side margins rounded, posterior margin almost straight with protruding, small apex in middle, lateral areas not raised,

Tegmentum surface barely visible, granules very close to each other. LA uniformly sculptured with more roundish and slightly smaller granules, arranged without pattern. CA sculptured with oval granules (180–210 μm long) arranged without pattern and very close, granules of similar shape and size on PA and JA. Each granule contains 1–3 megaesthete in central position surrounded by up to 20–25 microaesthetes in CA, little less (up to 15) in LA, all aesthetes of same size.

Articulamentum solid, apophyses wide, long, connected to primordium of insertion plates in intermediate valve.

Remarks. The fossil record of Hanleya sirenkoi sp. nov. is limited to the Pleistocene of S. Italy. Our material is represented by a unique intermediate valve not complete, but with a series of characteristics very different from the other spp. of Hanleya described here and such as to justify the establishment of a new species. Notwithstanding the incompletness of the unique valve, we have estimated the total width (put in brackets after the measured value) and the dorsal elevation H/W of the complete valve.

In some granules the size of the pores of the megalaesthetes seem slightly larger than those of microaesthetes, but this could be due to erosion, for which we rate megalaesthetes and microaesthetes roughly of the same size.

Comparisons. Hanleya sirenkoi sp. nov. shares the sculpture consisting of granules irregularly arranged without pattern with H. mediterranea Sirenko, 2014 , H. schwabei Dell’Angelo, Sosso & Taviani, 2024 and H. sossoi Dell’Angelo, Landau, Van Dingenen & Ceulemans, 2018, from which it differs for the larger and very close granules (only H. sossoi has granules of similar size, but with a different arrangement) and the distinct structure of the aesthetes.

Distribution. Pleistocene: central Mediterranean, S. Italy: Vallone Catrica (this study).