The shells are characterized by being rather solid in structure, generally spindle-shaped, the columella with or without plicae and possessing a color pattern of numerous spiral rows of spots or bands. The protoconch is membranous and is lost. The nuclear whorls consist of a papilliform nucleus, the calcarella, which enlarges rapidly into a normal whorl. The nuclear whorls are generally smooth, the postnuclear whorls finely sculptured. Radula exceedingly small and short and consisting only of a single row of rachidian teeth in all of the species so far examined. Operculum absent so far as known.
The history of this genus and its type designations has not been a fortunate one. Swainson included four "typical species" in his genus Scaphella, namely undulata, junonia, maculata and zebra. J. E. Gray in 1847 listed Scaphella of Swainson with two type designations: his first, Voluta fusiformis, based on Swainson 1840, was invalid since this species was not listed by Swainson in 1832 in his original diagnosis of the genus. Gray's second choice was that of Voluta junonia, a species included by Swainson in 1832. So far as I can trace, this was the first type designation of this genus. This selection was followed by Dall who in 1890 indicated the same type. Unfortunately, Dall in 1906 completely overlooked his early designation and that of Gray by introducing the genus Maculopeplum and gave Voluta junonia as its type. This latter type selection, of course, makes Maculopeplum an absolute synonym of Scaphella.
Smith (1942, p. 55) in a footnote states "Scaphella having been discarded" and proceeds to erect a new subfamily, Auriniinae, to replace Scaphellinae. I can find no valid grounds at all to discard Scaphella, nor does Smith give tiny reasons whatsoever for his stand. His name Auriniinae becomes an absolute synonym of Scaphellinae.
Dall states (1907, p. 300) that both Aurinia and Scaphella s.s. (Maculopeplum) represent two divergent lines of development from the Eocene genus, Caricella. Aurinia is also related to the recent Eastern Atlantic genus Halia. in this latter genus the shell has become very thin and rather broad, structurally a very different appearing genus. The persistence of the spiral rows of color spots is rather remarkable, considering the rather striking modifications that have taken place in the morphological structures of the shells.