Plectronocerida is a primitive order from which subsequent cephalopod orders are ultimately derived.
Pseudohaloritidae is the larger of two families that form the goniatitid superfamily Pseudohaloritoidea, the other being the monogenerc Maximitidae. They are part of the vast array of shelled cephalopods known as ammonoids that are more closely related to squids, belemnites, octopuses, and cuttlefish, than to the superficially similar Nautilus.
Discoceras is an extinct marine cephalopod mollusk, a member of the Trocholitidae in the Tarphycerida. It is distinct from Discosorus, It is characterized by closely coiled, gradually expanding shells with a subquadrate cross section, that may be ribbed or smooth. The sides are broadly rounded; the venter is wide and slightly rounded. The maximum width is slightly dorsal of the middle. The dorsum has a slight to moderate impression. The siphuncle starts off central for the first half whorl then becomes marginodorsal in the succeeding two whorls, then subdorsal at maturity. As with Trocholites, the dorsal siphuncle in Discoceras probably indicates an orientation during life that places the back of the living chamber high in the shell.
The Tarphycerida were the first of the coiled cephalopods, found in marine sediments from the Lower Ordovician to the Middle Devonian. Some, such as Aphetoceras and Estonioceras, are loosely coiled and gyroconic; others, such as Campbelloceras, Tarphyceras, and Trocholites, are tightly coiled, but evolute with all whorls showing. The body chamber of tarphycerids is typically long and tubular, as much as half the length of the containing whorl in most, greater than in the Silurian Ophidioceratidae. The Tarphycerida evolved from the elongated, compressed, exogastric Bassleroceratidae, probably Bassleroceras, around the end of the Gasconadian through forms like Aphetoceras. Close coiling developed rather quickly, and both gyroconic and evolute forms are found in the early middle Canadian.
Tarphyceras is a genus of tarphyceratid with whorls rounded in cross section, having a deeply impressed dorsum and a ventral to subcentral siphuncle, known from the Lower Ord of North America. It differs from Campbelloceras in that Campbelloceras is only slightly impressed, from Centrotarphyceras in that Centrotarphyceras is subquadrate and has a central siphuncle, and from Trocholites in that although Trocholites is subcircular in cross section, the siphuncle is subdorsal.
Gonioceras is an extinct genus of actinocerid nautiloidean cephalopods typified by a broad, low shell; flattened ventrally, convexly rounded dorsally; top and bottom meeting at an acute angle along the sides. In most the shell is rather thin, especially along the lateral portion. The aperture is contracted. Sutures from broad ventral and dorsal lobes, more narrowly rounded ventro-lateral and dorso-lateral saddles, and sharp pointed lateral lobes; more complex than in later Lambeoceras. The siphuncle is typically subcentral but may be closer to the venter; armenocerid in form with short segments and very short brims and containing a straight endosiphuncular canal system.
Aturia is an extinct genus of Paleocene to Miocene nautilids within Aturiidae, a monotypic family, established by Campman in 1857 for Aturia Bronn, 1838, and is included in the superfamily Nautilaceae in Kümmel 1964.
Curtoceras is a genus in the tarphycerid family Trocholitidae found widespread in the late Early and Middle Ordovician of North America and northern Europe. Curtoceras has a shell that is gradually expanded, with half the fully mature body chamber divergent from the preceding volution. Whorl sections are near equidimentional with the inner margin (dosum) moderately impressed. The surface may be smooth or weakly ribbed. The siphuncle is ventral in the initial chamber and becomes dorsal after one volution. With the exception of the dorsal siphuncle, Curtoceras is somewhat similar to the tarphyceratid Campbelloceras
The Tarphyceratidae are tightly coiled, evolute Tarphycerida with ventral siphuncles. The dorsum is characteristically impressed where the whorl presses against the venter of the previous. The Tarphyceratidae are derived from Bassleroceras or possibly from some member of the Estonioceratidae.
The Trocholitidae are Tarphycerida with whorls in close contact as with the Tarphyceratidae, but in which the siphuncle, similar in structure, becomes dorsal. The Trocholitidae are derived from the Tarphyceratidae, perhaps from different tarphyceratids.
Brevicoceras is an extinct nautiloid genus from the order Oncocerida with wide distribution in the Middle Devonian in Eastern North America, Russia and Morocco. Nautiloids form a broad group of shelled cephalopods that were once diverse and numerous but are now represented by only a handful of species in two genera.
Solenochilus, type genus of the Solenochilidae is an extinct cosmopotilian nautilid from the Lower Pennsylvanian to the Lower Permian with a rapidly expanding, coiled globular shell with few whorls, from which prominent spines extend laterally from the umbilical area at maturity. Solenochilus is derived from the Upper Mississippian Acanthonautilus, principally through evolutionary changes in the siphuncle.
Nybyoceras is an actinocerid genus assigned to the Armenoceratidae and similar to Armenoceras except for having a siphuncle close to the ventral side of the shell.
Syringonautilidae is a family of Nautiloidea from the middle to late Triassic. Syringonautilidae comprise the last of the Trigonoceratoidea and are the source for the Nautilaceae which continued the Nautiloidea through the Mesozoic and into the Cenozoic right down to the recent. Syringonautilidae is a strictly Triassic family, derived early in the Triassic from the Grypoceratidae.
The Centroceratidae is the ancestral family of the Trigonoceratoidea and of the equivalent Centroceratina; extinct shelled cephalopods belonging to the order Nautilida
Mandaloceratidae is a family in the nautiloid cephalopod order Discosorida, from the Middle and Upper(?) Silurian characterized by short, essentially straight shells referred to as breviconic, typically with a faintly exogastric shape produced by the profile of the body chamber.
The Naedyceras group comprises three similar and closely related openly coiled, gyroconic, genera within oncocerid family, Brevicoceratidae: Naedyceras, Gonionaedyceras, and Gyronaedyceras.
Ophioceras is a genus of closely coiled tarphycerid nautiloid cephalopods, the sole representatives of the family Ophidioceratidae, characterized by an evolute shell with narrow, subrounded, annulated whorls and a subcentral siphuncle composed of thin connecting rings that show no evidence of layering. The mature body chamber is strongly divergent and is the longest proportionally of any tarphycerid. The aperture has a deep hyponomic sinus and ocular sinuses, and so resembles some lituitids.
Discosoridae comprise a family of endogastric discosorids,, with endocones in the siphuncle, ranging from the Middle Silurian to Middle Devonian.
Plectolites is a genus of coiled nautiloid cephalopods from Nevada (USA) somewhat reminiscent of the genus Plectoceras of the Barrandeocerina.
