Hettangian to Pliensbachian neoselachian tooth assemblages from marine deposits in northwest Europe are dominated by palaeospinacids. In the Toarcian, elasmobranch faunas tend to be more diverse and several other neoselachian groups have their first occurrence. A small, but surprisingly diverse, neoselachian tooth assemblage, comprising seven taxa, has been extracted from Pliensbachian sediments within the Rya Formation in southern Sweden. The fauna includes five synechodontiform species; Synechodus occultidens, S. enniskilleni, "Synechodus" sp., Paraorthacodus sp., and Sphenodus sp. The remaining two species include Hexanchidae indet. and Agaleus dorsetensis. The exclusively Early Jurassic A. dorsetensis is separated from all other neoselachians on the basis of tooth morphology and is here included in the new, monotypic family Agaleidae nov. The assemblage from the Rya Formation is the first selachian fauna to be recorded from the Jurassic of Sweden and it has a composition quite different from contemporary faunas found in other areas of Europe. The neoselachian part of the fauna is more diverse while hybodont sharks are represented solely by a single species.

Key words: Neoselachians, Pliensbachian, Early Jurassic, Rya Formation, Scania, Sweden.

Jan Rees [Jan.Rees@geol.lu.se], Department of Geology, Lund University, Sölvegatan 13, SE-223 62 Lund, Sweden.