12 Journal New York Entomological Society. [Voi. xviii. 



Part II. The Paleontological Development of the Betiiylid^. 



The family Bethylidse was fir^t segregated and defined by Haliday 

 ('39) who considered it as forming a part of the fossorial Hymenop- 

 tera. It was, however, later removed by Westwood ('40) from this 

 position and assigned to a place among the Proctotrypidse of which 

 he believed it to represent a subfamily of equivalent rank to the 

 Ceraphroninae, Scelioninae, etc., which are now generally regarded as 

 distinct families of the Proctotrypoid series. In his earlier writings 

 Ashmead following Westwood included it as the subfamily Bethylinse 

 in his Monograph of the North American Proctotrypidae ('93). He 

 later, however, recognized its fossorial affinities and removed it to 

 his superfamily Vespoidea where it stands as a distinct family in his 

 classification of this group published in the Canadian Entomologist 

 for 1902. In this paper he gives the following condensed account of 

 his position in regard to the group : " I am now convinced that Hali- 

 day was right that these insects are allied to the fossorial wasps, and 

 have nothing to do with genuine Prototrypoids ; they are clearly 

 allied to the Chrysididae, through the Cleptinae and Amesiginje, and to 

 the Sapygidae, Tiphiidae, Cosilidae, Thynnidae, Myrmosidae and Mutilli- 

 dae, all parasitic families." It is thus clear that he considered their 

 affinities quite varied, including so many families as allied with them. 

 It is quite evident that his mention of the Chrysididae refers to the 

 genus Pristocera and its allies which show unmistakable resemblances 

 to that family, while the Sapygid and Tiphiid affinities were no doubt 

 based on Epyris and its allies, and those with the Thynnidae and 

 Myrmosidae probably on Dryinus, Pedinomma, etc. 



Since that time, one group regarded by Ashmead as a subfamily 

 has been separated from the Bethylidae, by Perkins ('05) and Kieffer 

 ('07) as the DryinidDs, but otherwise the group has remained intact. 



For some reason, possibly on account of their small size and not 

 very abundant occurrence in collections, these insects have not re- 

 ceived much attention in recent years until very lately, with the 

 exception of Ashmead's previously cited work (93). With the 

 discovery that some species of Gonatopus and related forms are im- 

 portant parasites of the leaf-hoppers injurious to sugar cane, this 

 part of the group has quite lately attracted more attention and a 

 considerable number of species have been described by Perkins ('05) 

 as well as by Kieffer, and several others. A considerable series 



