Wilhelm August Wenz (21 October 1886 – 12 September 1945) was a German

malacologist Malacology is the branch of invertebrate zoology that deals with the study of the Mollusca (mollusks or molluscs), the second-largest phylum of animals in terms of described species after the arthropods. Mollusks include snails and slugs, clams, ...

, born in

Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

. He is the author of the 7-part Gastropoda section of ''Handbuch der Paläozoologie'' (1938-1944), a very important review that described all known

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

genera. Only a few copies of this rare work survive: almost the entire stock of later editions was destroyed during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

Bibliography

(incomplete) * Fischer K. & Wenz W. A. (1914
''Die Landschneckenkalke des Mainzer Beckens und ihre Fauna''
* Wenz W. (1923-1930) "Gastropoda extramarina tertiaria" ''Fossilium catalogus, I: Animalia''. 3387 pp., published in parts. * Wenz W. (1938-1944) ''Teil 1: Allgemeiner Teil und

Prosobranchia Prosobranchia was a large taxonomic subclass of sea snails, land snails and freshwater snails. This taxon of gastropods dates back to the 1920s. It has however been proven to be polyphyletic (consisting of more than one lineage of descent). Gen ...

''. In: Schindewolf O. H. (ed.) ''Handbuch der Paläozoologie, Band 6, Gastropoda'', Verlag Gebrüder Bornträger, Berlin, xii + 1639 pp.

References

* Moore, R.C., Lalicker, C.G., and Fischer, A. G., 1952, ''Invertebrate Fossils'', McGraw Hill Book Company, New York; p. 334
Biographical Etymology of Marine Organism Names. V & W
1886 births 1945 deaths German malacologists 20th-century German zoologists {{Germany-zoologist-stub