This species is commonly regarded as having a cosmopolitan distribution. Thorough examination of specimens however casts doubt on this as there are at least three species in Northern Europe alone that were before mistakingly identified as Melinna cristata.
Mackie & Pleijel (1995: pages 104-111, figures 1-3) provide a thorough redescription of Melinna cristata adding valuable information to the original description and comparing the diagnostic features to the other two similar species in northern Europe (table 1).
The original types were collected in Norway, Bergen or Finnmark (not specified) but this material seems to be lost. Mackie & Pleijel revised the Melinna cristata species complex and designated a neotype from Norway, Hjeltefjord.
“Melinna cristata (Sars. 1851)
Plate XXVI, figs. 4, 5
Melinna cristata Ehlers, 1908, p. 144. Near Bouvet Island, in 457 m.
Monro, 1930, p. 181. Cumberland West Bay, South Georgia, in 110 m.
Diagnosis: Length of body 65 mm; width 8 mm; segments number 64. Prostomium trilobed. Branchiae number 4 pairs, those of a side basally fused. Crest of fifth segment with 7 to 15 crenulations (fig. 4). Large dorsal hooks behind branchial bases, with sharply recurved tips (fig. 5). Tube long, thick, covered with black mud.
Distribution: Arctic boreal, north and south Atlantic, South Georgia, and Antarctica; in moderate depths.”
(Hartman, 1966)
