Genus Brania Quatrefages, 1866

Brania Quatrefages, 1866: 18 .

Diagnosis. Body small, slender, with few segments. Prostomium with 2 pairs of eyes and, sometimes, 1 pair of eyespots, 3 bowling-pin to spindle-shaped antennae. Palps fused for about their basal 2 ⁄ 3, and the remaining distal 1 ⁄ 3 free. Two pairs of tentacular cirri, bottle-shaped, truncated or bowling-pin shaped. Dorsal cirri on all parapodia, short, bowling-pin shaped or truncated. Parapodia conical, with a distal, rounded small papilla. Parapodial glands present, sometimes inside dorsal cirri. Pharynx provided with an anterior tooth, surrounded by a crown of soft papillae. Compound chaetae with unidentate blades provided with subdistal spines and rounded tips; aciculae with rounded, slightly hollow tips. Dorsal simple chaetae usually subdistally serrated.Ventral simple chaetae sigmoid, usually unidentate. Mature males with natatory chaetae; mature females brooding eggs and juveniles ventrally, without natatory chaetae.

Type species. Exogone pusilla Dujardin, 1839 (fide Hartman, 1959).

Key to the species of Brania recorded from Australia

1 Dorsal cirri distally truncated, with fibrillar inclusions .................................................. B. pusilla

—— Dorsal cirri distally rounded, not truncated, without fibrillar inclusions ........................................................................................................................................ 2

2 Marked dorsoventral gradation in length of blades of compound chaetae throughout; posterior dorsal simple chaetae with about 4 similar subdistal serrations; dorsal cirri with subdistal constriction more or less marked .................................................................................................... B. articulata

—— Slight dorsoventral gradation in length of blades of compound chaetae; posterior dorsal simple chaetae with subdistal serrations of different sizes; dorsal cirri without subdistal constriction .................................. B. furcelligera