Taxonomy of Radiolari

The earliest and most comprehensive taxonomic classification of radiolarians was published by Haeckel (1881, 1887) after ten years of intensive work on the very rich material collected by the H.M.S. Challenger Expedition during the years 1873-1876. This classification was based on the geometry of the shell, the number of segments (nassellarians) or concentric shells (spumellarians), the presence and the number of feet (nassellarians) or arms (discoidal spumellarians), the presence of latticed or spongy shells (spumellarians), the presence or absence of a terminal aperture (nassellarians), etc. Haeckel himself (Haeckel, 1887) admitted the artificial character o f his taxonomic classification, but his classificatory system remained in use until very recendy, al­ though criticised by many authors, such as Biitschli (1889), Tan Sin Hok (1927), Deflandre (1953), Riedel (1967, 1971), Foreman (1968), and Petrushevskaya (1971). The first modern revision of Haeckels classification was done by Campbell (1954), but this effort resulted in more complication than clarity. Applying mechanically the ICZN guidelines, Campbell designated type species for ail radiolarian genera that were described by Haeckel on the basis o f Cainozoic specimens. Unfortunately, many of these type species had never been illustrated by Haeckel, or had been previously described by Rust (1885) from thin sections of Mesozoic rocks, and named following Haeckelian taxonomy. Thus, Campbell made many genera unrecognisable or changed completely the meaning of some of Haeckel’s genera and families. Deflandre (I960), Riedel (1967), Petrushevskaya (1971), Merinfeld (1980), Lombari and Lazarus (1988) and many other radiolarists recognised these great defects of Campbells work and tried, without positive results, to have it placed in the Official Index of Rejected Works in Zoology.