Bathycrinidae Bather 1899

Description of order Bougueticrinida: Crinoids with the stalk retained throughout life; lacking true cirri but attaching to the substrate either by branching irregular radicular 'cirri' arising from the more distal (lowet) columnals or by an enlarged terminal plate. Descriptioon of family: Bourgueticrinids with new columnalsonly developed at the top of the stalk, one or more of the uppermost ones being discoidal, though most are longer than broad, attachment by radicular 'cirri'; calyx thick-walled, relatively small, inverted conical or more or less cylindrical in shape, the plates of the well-developed basal ring either separate or fused together, longer or shorter than the radials above and alternating with them, the radials either fused or separate or occasionally even fused with he basals; radials bearing either simple arms - usually five in number - or division series of normally two ossicles, the second one axillary and bearing a pair of arms; brachials mostly with alternating muscular and syzygal ligamentous joints, the proximal ones lacking pinnules. Mostly slender and delicate forms, the arms usually lost in preserved specimens. Clark & Courtman-Stock, 1976 <554>.