« Small shell, of which we have found only a little number of individuals, and which seems very different from all the other species included among Trochus and Monodonta; it should belong to this last genus if it is kept. It increases the number of these uncertain species between Trochids and Turbans: it has quite the external shape of the latter; the spire is long enough, there are six convex whorls, sculpted of transverse, fine, unequal, close and convex striae; these streaks are deeper on the first whorls than on the last; the latter is very obtuse at the periphery, convex below, pierced in the center of a very small and white umbilicus; the aperture is oblique, almost round, with thin, sharp edges, with the exception of the columellar one, which is more obtuse and provided near its base with a slight inflection. » – G. P. Deshayes: “Mollusques” in Bory de Saint-Vincent: Expédition scientifique de Morée vol. III part I, Paris 1835, p.143.

« The colour of this species is not very variable: it is of a brownish red, sometimes uniform, sometimes interrupted by some white and longitudinal flammules; sometimes small whitish punctuations are irregularly scattered on the streaks. » – G. P. Deshayes: op. cit. Despite what this author wrote, the species does vary (but rarely) in colours, and not only in patterns; variable also is the strength of the spiral ribs.