''Maretia'' is a genus of

heart urchin The heart urchins or Spatangoida are an order of sea urchins. Their body is a somewhat elongated oval in form, and is distinguished by the mouth being placed towards one end of the animal, and the anus towards the other. As a result, heart urch ...

s belonging to the family

Spatangidae The Spatangidae are a family of heart urchin The heart urchins or Spatangoida are an order of sea urchins. Their body is a somewhat elongated oval in form, and is distinguished by the mouth being placed towards one end of the animal, and the ...

Species

* '' Maretia carinata'' Bolau, 1873 * '' Maretia cordata'' Mortensen, 1948 * '' Maretia estenozi'' Sánchez Roig, 1926 * ''Maretia planulata'' ( Lamarck, 1816)

Description

These sea urchins are irregular, as the mouth is located at the front of the underside of the animal, while the anus is located in rear end position. Spatangidae - Maretia pavesi

Fossil record

Fossils of ''Maretia'' are found in marine strata from the Eocene until the

Quaternary The Quaternary ( ) is the current and most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS). It follows the Neogene Period and spans from 2.58 million years ...

(age range: from 40.4 to 0.012 million years ago.). Fossils are known from some localities in United Kingdom, United States, Germany, Cuba, Indonesia, New Zealand, and

Eritrea Eritrea ( ; ti, ኤርትራ, Ertra, ; ar, إرتريا, ʾIritriyā), officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of Eastern Africa, with its capital and largest city at Asmara. It is bordered by Ethiopia ...

and Greece.Paleobiologhy Database
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References

* Rowe, F.W.E & Gates, J. (1995). Echinodermata. In ‘Zoological Catalogue of Australia’. 33 (Ed A. Wells.) pp xiii + 510 (CSIRO Australia, Melbourne.)

External links

Flickr

Spatangoida maretia Taxa named by John Edward Gray {{echinoidea-stub