Chinese contribution to the study of marine bivalves is well known, and it was reviewed and summarized by Zhuang [1992], and partly by P. Valentich-Scott [2003]. Taxonomic studies in China started later than in western countries, and the period between the 1950s–1990s, after liberation of the country, was the time of intensive sampling and research on taxonomy, biology, ecology and fisheries of bivalves – from the Xisha Islands and Tonkin (Beibu) Gulf in the south to the Yalu River mouth in the north. Collected material is mostly housed in the Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (Academia Sinica), Qingdao. Chinese malacologists published several important taxonomic monographs in the series «Fauna Sinica» such as those on the Pteriina [Wang, 2002], Protobranchia and Anomalodesmata [Xu, 1999], Mytiloida [Wang, 1997], and Veneridae [Zhuang, 2001] as well as a number of papers in magazines and collected scientific papers of research institutions. One important contribution to the Chinese molluscan fauna, a study on Tellinoidea, was made by the famous Russian malacologist O.A. Scarlato [1965]. Two catalogues of bivalve mollusks of the Chinese seas were published in the 1990s [Bernard et al., 1993; Xu, 1997]. Finally, a taxonomic review of the Chinese molluscan fauna, «Seashells of China», including 605 species of Bivalvia illustrated in color was published in English [Qi, 2004]. Another color book appeared earlier [Wang et al., 1988]. A very important latest contribution is «An Illustrated Bivalvia Mollusca Fauna of China Seas» [Xu, Zhang, 2008]. There are a number of regional guide-books on bivalves of China. To date, Chinese malacologists have described more than 50 species of marine Bivalvia as new to science. Most of original descriptions contained drawings and rarely photographs. A majority of types of these new species are currently stored in the Marine Biological Museum, Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences. We undertook a compilation of the catalogue of all isolated types deposited in a special repository in the above museum. In the course of this work, we met some difficulties related to the status of types and the translation of original labels from Chinese into English. Illustrations to the catalogue include both drawings taken from original publications and photographs. The museum numbers of the type material were taken from original descriptions, but we provide also the registration numbers from labels which are often different. Measurements of shells are given as they appear in the original descriptions; in this case, we provide a reference to publications; otherwise we give our own measurements.