Shells small to medium-sized, flattened to subglobose, with a half-moon shaped aperture, an umbilicus moderately to nearly clogged by a callus; often, a spiral ridge curls inside the umbilicus: the funiculum; labial margin thin. Last whorl inflated, suture shallow. Protoconch turbiniform, usually smooth, partly concealed by the teleoconch.
 

Shell globose; operculum calcareous.
 

The genus is, nowadays, monospecific. Spire moderately low; suture marked, with a distinct subsutural shelf; umbilicus wide; funiculum narrow; microsculpture made of dense, thin, slightly prosocline growth marks that become stronger below the suture and around the basal fasciole (the abapical part of the umbilicus, anterior to the funiculum); weak spirals on the body whorl; operculum with a single ridge on the labial side.
 

Naticinae with a smooth, not sulcate operculum, and with the umbilicus completely covered by a semicircular extension of the columellar callus.
 

Spire moderately low, suture marked, with a distinct subsutural shelf; umbilicus wide but sometimes almost entirely sealed by a massive funiculum and its anterior termination: the umbilical callus; basal fasciole large; microsculpture made of conspicuously prosocline growth marks, stronger on the subsutural shelf and inside the basal fasciole. The main distinctive characteristic of the genus is given by the operculum, which bears, in addition to a strong marginal bead, some marked spiral striae on the outer half; inner half smoother.
 

Shell globose, slightly elongate; suture marked, with a distinct subsutural shelf; umbilicus narrow, reduced to a curved slit by the presence of an important half-moon shaped umbilical callus; parietal callus restricted to a small triangle in the adapical extremity of the columella; operculum smooth, with a very shallow marginal ridge, more or less visible, followed by an inner ridge often much more conspicuous.
 

Shell globose, slightly elongate; suture marked; umbilicus narrow, often sealed by the callosity of the funiculum; parietal callus in continuity with the umbilical one; microsculpture of fine growth marks; operculum nearly smooth, only adorned with very weak and thin spiral striae.
 

Shell semi-globose to globose; operculum horny.
 

Spire moderately elongate, as well as the last whorl, which is slightly less radially expanded than in the Cochlis; suture marked; umbilicus adapically clogged by an axially extended parietal callus; funiculum very posteriorly placed, hidden by the parietal callus, or absent; operculum corneous.
 

Shell moderately flat to globose, unpatterned, with a conical spire; suture shallow; no subsutural shelf; umbilicus partially to totally covered by the gibbous callus of the funiculum; sculpture of marked prosocline growth marks, stronger below the suture and inside the basal fasciole.
 

Shell flattened to conical, spire very reduced, last whorl extremely developed; operculum horny.
 

Shell pale, flattened to conical and always with a flat base; suture shallow; no umbilicus; aperture wide; sculpture of spiral striae crossed by weaker growth marks; operculum very small.