A new species of Pseudhimalayites (Ammonitina, Aspidoceratoidea) from the Lower Tithonian of the Betic Range, Southern Spain

Abstract

The Late Jurassic aspidoceratoid genus Pseudhimalayites Spath is scarcely recorded but widely distributed in the Andean basins, the Caribbean region, and in the European Tethys. From Ponti Zone (Lower Tithonian) rocks of the Betic Range in Carchelejo we describe here the new species Pseudhimalayites carchelejensis, based on a macroconch (female) holotype. The corresponding microconch (male), described from the same ammonite assemblage, would  belong to the morphogenus Simocosmoceras Spath which groups the microconchs of Pseudhimalayites. P. carchelejensis n. sp. differs from the coeval Pseudhimalayites steinmanni (Haupt) by lacking ventral tubercles in the phragmocone and by bearing umbilical tubercles only from the adult whorl of the phragmocone. These differences illustrate a significant morphologic divergence between the Andean and the Tethyan lineages.