The genus Taranis was proposed by Jeffreys (1870) for shells with an apex similar to that of Trophon Montfort, 1810, very short canal, "peculiar sculpture" and lacking an anal sinus or operculum. Conchologically, Taranis is somewhat similar to the genera Oenopota Morch, 1852 and Micropleurotoma Thiele, 1929, as these are characterized by small shells, with strongly middle-angled whorls, short anterior canal and shallow sinuses. However, Taranis moerchi can be distinguished by its rather typical protoconch of two whorls with spiral threads or rows of beads and teleoconch with lamellate axial sculpture and microscopic sculpture of minute granules (adapted from Kilburn, 1991 and Powell, 1966). Casey (1904) suggested the tribe Taranini to contain only the genus Taranis, mentioning that "the very broad shallow anal sinus situated on the periphery and not on or near the suture" was the most important feature separating this group from the other tribes. Kantor and Sysoev (1989) elevated Casey's tribe Taranini to subfamily status, based on the absence of the radula and the reduction of several features of foregut anatomy. This classification has been used, although reluctantly, by other authors (Kilburn, 1991; Taylor et al, 1993) and we retain it in the present paper. Bouchet and Rocroi (2005) placed Taraninae as a synonym of Raphitominae Bellardi, 1875, in spite of several anatomical differences between these groups. As stated by Taylor et al. (1993), the very simplified morphology makes the evaluation of the status of the subfamily difficult, and we prefer to keep them provi-sionally separated.