Ashgill trilobite faunas from the Llŷn Peninsula,North Wales,U.K.

The Crugan Mudstone Formation is formalized and the Dwyfor Mudstone Formation proposed for restricted Ashgill outcrops respectively near Llanbedrog and Llanystwmdwy in the Ll?n Peninsula. These mudstones contain brachiopods of the Foliomena fauna and a total of 26 determined genera of trilobites, one, Pseudosphaeroxochus represented by a new species, P. seabornei sp. nov. Elements of the trilobite fauna are used to demonstrate a Rawtheyan age for the mudstones. The generic assemblages both of brachiopods and of trilobites present in the mudstones indicate relatively deep water environments of deposition, that of the Dwyfor Mudstones probably being the deeper. The trilobites belong to what is here described as the Nankinolithus-Opsimasaphus association.