Meriania. 507 



The species are parasitic on Heterocera and belong to Pantel's 

 group 4. 



Of the genus two palæarctic species are known, one occurring 

 in Denmark. 



1. M. puparum Fabr. 



1794. Fabr. Ent. Syst. IV, 326, 58 et 1805. Syst. Antl. 299, 80 (Musca). 

 — 1824. Meig. Syst. Beschr. IV, 251, 21. Tab. XLI, Fig. 22 [Tachina) et 1838. 

 VII, 221, 6, Tab. LXX, Fig. 29—30 {Nemoraea). — 1844. Zett. Dipt. Scand. 

 III, 1098, 95 (Tachina). — 1862. Schin. F. A. I, 449 (Nemoraea). — 1891. B. B. 

 Denkschr. Akad. Wiss. Wien, LVIII, 313 (Platychira). — 1896. Pand. Rev. 

 Entom. XV, 31, 1, p. p. (Erigone). — 1907. Villen. Ann. Soc. Ent. de Fr. LXXVI, 

 387. — 1907. Kat. palåarkt. Dipt. III, 219. — 1921. Baer, Zeitschr. f. angew. 

 Ent. VII, 135. — 1924. Stein, Arch. f. Naturgescli. 90, 6, 54. — T. tricincta 

 Fall. 1820. Dipt. Suec. Muse. 26, 53. 



Male. Frons narrow (1/4 — 1/5 of the breadth of the eye), very 

 protruding; cheeks not half as broad as the eye, and jowls more than 

 half the height of the eye. Orbits and cheeks yellowish white pruinose, 

 dark reflecting; epistoma more greyish; jowls grey; frontal stripe 

 black, a little reddish. Orbits and cheeks with fine yellow hairs, below 

 on orbits some black hairs; jowls with blackish, downwards brownish 

 yellow hairs. Occiput grey, with yellow hairs, and downwards black 

 hairs behind postocular bristles. Eyes with longish brown hairs. 

 Antennæ with basal joints reddish, third black, rounded at end; 

 arista thickened in fully basal half. Palpi brownish yellow, often dark 

 at apex. Thorax brownish black, not shining, with greyish pruinosity 

 at the sides and just in front, so that here three dark stripes are 

 seen, the median broadest and with a narrow dark stripe at each 

 side; sometimes the stripes can be traced also posteriorly; postalar 

 calli and scutellum reddish brown. Thorax black-haired, or the hairs 

 more blackish brown; pleura with long black, posteriorly yellowish 

 hairs. Abdomen brownish black, not shining, with a large reddish 

 spot on each side; third to fifth segment with a greyish white pruinose 

 band on the front half, more or less divided in the middle, broadly 

 so on third segment. Abdomen black-haired, second segment with a 

 pair of weak marginal bristles, third with a pair of discai and mar- 

 ginal and fourth with a pair of discai and a row of marginal; fifth 

 segment with bristles all over; the discai bristles, especially on third 

 segment, often weak and slightly individualised. Fifth sternite cleft 

 about to the middle, the lamellæ short, triangularly rounded. Præ- 

 hypopygial segment shining, with dense hairs. Hypopygium with 



