HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE CLASSIFICATION 



OF MOSQUITOES. 



Linnaeus in 1758 founded the genus Culex, containing several species, some 

 of which are not now considered to belong to the Culicidae. The first species 

 contained in Linngeus's genus is Culex pipiens Linnteus, now generally recog- 

 nized as the type of the genus and the family. From time to time new species 

 and genera were added by various authors. Meigen proposed the genera Ano- 

 pheles and Aedes in 1818. Culex was restricted to the forms with long palpi in 

 the male and short palpi in the female; Anopheles was separated from Culex by 

 the long palpi of the female, Aedes by the short palpi of the male. He was 

 followed in 1827 by Eobineau-Desvoidy, who adopted the genera of Meigen and 

 established three new ones, Sahethes, Megarhinus, and Psorophora, without 

 reference to the characters used by Meigen. Megarhinus was founded on the 

 curved proboscis and narrow wings ; Sahethes on the ciliate tibige and tarsi of 

 the middle legs; Psorophora was founded, not as is generally supposed on the 

 ciliation of the legs, but upon the structure of the prothorax, which, however, 

 offers nothing peculiar or tangible, and the supposed presence of ocelli. These 

 genera were for the most part rejected by subsequent workers as insufficiently 

 founded. 



In 1881 Lynch Arribalzaga recognized all the previously established genera 

 and in addition proposed the genera Ochlerotatus, Tceniorhynchus, Janthino- 

 soma, Heteronycha, and Uranotania. He separated his genera principally on 

 the number of joints in the palpi and the armature of the claws in the two sexes, 

 in addition to the previously used characters. Owing apparently to some mis- 

 identifications of species or other error, his definitions of Culex and Aedes are 

 wrong, and there are several errors in his table, so that many of the genera are 

 not tangibly defined. In 1896, Williston proposed the single genus Hmnagogus, 

 the palpi short in both sexes and said to be five-jointed. 



The discovery of the role of mosquitoes in the transmission of disease at once 

 produced great activity in the study of these insects. It was early found that not 

 all species of mosquitoes transmit disease and it was only natural that there 

 should have been a desire to express in classification the differences which were 

 so significant from a pathological standpoint. These differences were obvious 

 and seemed very significant when only a few forms were studied, but with the 

 widening of the field this preoccupation brought about a highly artificial system 

 of classification. 



Grassi assisted by Noe, in 1901, in his " Studi di uno zoologo sulla malaria," 

 divided the mosquitoes into two subfamilies, the Anophelinae and the Culicinse, 

 leaving out of consideration certain genera which were unknown to him. The 

 Anophelinas were defined by the long palpi of the female, the presence of a single 



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