Fossils of Encrinus went by several names in Germany before the establishment of modern paleontology. In Lower Saxony, they were called Sonnenräder ("sun wheels"), while in Thuringia and Hesse they were called Bonifatiuspfennige ("Saint Boniface's pennies"). In southwestern Germany, they went by Hexengeld ("witches' money"). The animal was correctly reconstructed for the first time in 1729, although various parts of the animal had been described before that.[4] Encrinus was described in 1764. It was assigned to the order Encrinida by Jack Sepkoski in 2002.