The biostratigraphic significance of selected uppermost Famennian (Upper Devonian) and lower Tournaisian (Mississippian) brachiopod genera, belonging to the orders Rhynchonellida (e.g. Araratella), Spiriferida (e.g. Sphenospira, Prospira), Spiriferinida (Syringothyris) and Productida (except Chonetidina), is discussed. Owing to the difficulties of identifying productidine and strophalosiidine genera, in contrast to rhynchonellides and spiriferides, the biostratigraphic potential of the former has generally been overlooked. Brachiopods flourished in neritic environments that were unfavourable for conodonts and ammonoids. In the absence of the latter traditional marker fossils, they are potentially important for locating the Devonian–Carboniferous boundary in shallow water depositional settings in conjunction with rugose corals and foraminifers. On a worldwide scale, further work is required to reach a better assessment of the aftermath of the Hangenberg biological Crisis on brachiopods, notably in revising the faunas from the classical areas of the Famennian and Tournaisian stages in Western Europe.

Spire-bearing brachiopods formally comprise four different rhynchonelliform orders. A calcified spiral brachidium (presumably supporting a spirolophe when alive) and variable median fold and sulcus (probably aiding separation of incurrent from excurrent flows) are peculiar characteristics they all share. Inferences regarding feeding current systems for these extinct taxa have long remained controversial. Two rival models (the Williams–Ager model and the Rudwick–Vogel model) have been developed, each of which has gained supporters as well as critics over the years. In this present paper they are both contrasted and reassessed on the basis of available evidence, together with a new approach that combines: (a) a morpho-functional analysis applying the plankton net as a suitable seston-collecting paradigm; (b) a review of actualistic data showing that all extant spirolophes are functionally inhalant (irrespective of water entering the valves laterally or not); (c) an evaluation of known outcomes from flume experiments yielding consistent empirical results where gaping shells are oriented transversally and dorsally upcurrent; and (d) a reappraisal of the distributions of certain epizoobionts and endosymbionts revealing compatible patterns. The evidence thus accumulated supports the main conclusion that, in most groups (with laterally tapering spiralia), the inhalant current was located medially with the exhalant currents on either side; only in atrypides (with centrally to dorsally tapering spiralia) does the reverse situation appear to have occurred.