Captain Thomas Brown (1785–1862): his life and molluscan taxa

A biography is provided for Captain Thomas Brown, who lived in Scotland and England, and is known to have visited Ireland and France. He chiefly made his living as a writer and publisher of popular natural history books, and eventually as a curator of the Manchester Museum. In malacology, he is most noted for two editions of a book on the Recent molluscs of the British Isles, one edition of a book on its fossil fauna, and a major paper on Carboniferous molluscs. Sadly, most of the types of his Recent species have been lost. Brown introduced 43 genera and 440 species, including unavailable names published in synonymies. Some genera are still in use. The species include 46% gastropods, 43% bivalves, 9% cephalopods, and 2% other classes. The species are 45% Recent, 23% Carboniferous, 10% Quaternary, 7% Jurassic, and 15% other epochs. We additionally list 13 taxa that have been misattributed to him. About a quarter of his taxa lack modern placements. Here we designate Sipho striata T. Brown, 1827, to be the type species of Sipho T. Brown, 1827, affirming its place as a junior synonym of Puncturella R.T. Lowe, 1827. We designate Turbo graphicus T. Brown, 1818, as the type species of Pyramis T. Brown, 1827 [non Röding, 1798, nec Schumacher, 1817], ensuring its position as a junior synonym of Cingula J. Fleming, 1818. We designate Brochus striatus T. Brown, 1827, as the type species of Brochus T. Brown, 1827, ensuring its place as a synonym of Caecum J. Fleming, 1813. We designate Planaria alba T. Brown, 1827, as type species of Planaria T. Brown, 1827 [non Planaria O.F. Müller, 1776], fixing its position in the synonymy of Gyraulus Charpentier, 1837. We designate Cochlea virgata da Costa, 1778, as the type species of Heliomanes T. Brown, 1844 [non Newman, 1840], ensuring its placement as a synonym of Cernuella Schlüter, 1838. Naticopsis mazaevi Coan & Goodwin, 2026, is proposed as a replacement name for the Upper Permian Natica minima T. Brown, 1841, non I. Lea, 1833. Volutopsius golikovi Coan & Goodwin, 2026, is proposed as a replacement name for the Recent northwestern Pacific Fusus castaneus Mörch, 1848, non T. Brown, 1827.