NO. 1310. XORTH AMERICAN THYSANOPTERA— HINDS. 81 



striata; to Prof. C. P. Gillette for the loan of his supposed Thrips 

 striatus; to Prof. H. E. Somers for sending- the types of Miss Beach 

 and Professor Osborn, with their kind permission, to Dr. Henrv 

 Uzel for the positive identification of Thrips tahacl with his Thrips 

 communis^ and finally to Dr. L. O. Howard and Mr. Theodore 

 Pergande for giving nie access to the material in the United States 

 National Museum collection. 



This paper forms the major portion of a thesis for the degree of 

 doctor of philosoph\ at the Massachusetts Agricultural College, where 

 it has been prepared under the supervision of Prof. Charles II. Fernald 

 and Dr. Henry T. Fernald, Avho have charge of the work in the depart- 

 ment of entomology. To both, for the many ways in which they have 

 guided and encouraged me in the work of the past three years, I give 

 my heartiest thanks. 



HISTORY OF THYSANOPTERA. 



These insects were first described b}^ DeGeer in 1744, under the 

 name Physapus (2). Linnteus ignored this name and placed the four 

 species known to him in a genus which he called llirqj,^, locating it in the 

 order Hemiptera, immediately after his genus Coccus (5). In 1806, C. 

 Dumeril raised the group to the rank of a family, which he called 

 Vesitarses or Phj^sapodes but retained it in the order Hemiptera 

 (11). C. F. Fallen (17), in 1814, changed the name of the family to 

 "Thripsites,'' but did not change its ordinal position, and this name 

 was retained by Newman (01) as the name of a "natural order," which, 

 however, had only family value. In 1826, Latreille (50) used for 

 them the names Thripsides and Physapi. A. H. Haliday, in 1836, 

 published an extensive study of the British insects belonging to this 

 group and concluded that thev should be given the rank of an 

 order, for which he proposed the name Th^'sanoptera (68). Probably 

 about two years later, Burmeister (69) also gave them ordinal rank, 

 with the name Physapoda, since which time most writers have 

 adopted one or the other of these ordinal names. Those who adopt 

 Physapoda appear to base their preference largelj" upon the priority 

 of Dumeril's use of the name Physapodes, Physopoda (Physapoda) 

 being a re-formation of the term. It does not, however, seem to the 

 writer that this position can be sustained, as at that time there was no 

 genus Phympus^ DeGeer's name having no standing, as it was given 

 before the tenth edition of Systema Nature." 



It seems therefore that Haliday was the first to give the group the 

 rank of an order and to apply thereto a properly formed ordinal name: 

 Thysanoptera, from Siffavog^ a tassel, and 7tTepoi\ a wing. This 

 basing of the name upon characters of the wings is in accord with 

 general usage in the various orders of insects. I believe that Thysan- 



"See Canons Y and XIII, A. O. U. Code, 1892. 

 Proc, K M. vol. xxvi~02 6 



