[Introduction] In studying some polychaete material from the Chesapeake Bay, collected by Dr. Marvin Wass of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, 5 species of pilargids were found, including 3 new species and a species that appeared to be one of the questionable species of Webster, 1879, from Virginia. This prompted a review of the family. The Pilargidae was monographed by Hartman in 1947, including descriptions of 5 species, references to 21 species in all, and keys to the species of
Pilargis,
Ancistrosyllis, and
Loandalia. Seven additional species and 3 genera were listed by Hartman in 1959 and 10 species and 1 genus have been added since 1959, bringing to 38 the number of species included up to the present time in this family.
Ancistrosyllis longicirrata Berkeley and Berkeley, 1961, was placed by the authors in the Pilargidae but an examination of the holotype, sent on loan through the kindness of Cyril Berkeley, shows that it should be referred to
Podarmus Chamberlin in the Polynoidae; it is redescribed in this paper.