Americana 



VOL. III. 



BROOKLYN, JULY, 1887. 



NO. 4. 



The Scolopendridae of the United States. 



By Lucien M. Underwood, Ph. D. 



Through the kindness of the curators of the U. S. National Museum 

 I have had the opportunity to study its collection of Myriapoda^ which 

 though not a large one is especially rich in the larger centipedes of this 

 country. Recent studies by Kohlrausch- and Meinert-^ have greatly 

 modified the subject of specific determination in this family and have 

 reduced many of the species described by Newport, Wood, Koch, 

 Saussure and Porath so that an extensive array of synonyms stands as 

 the result of their labors. Characters now known to be individual have 

 been relied on hitherto as specific, and the study of larger numbers of 

 specimens has made in some instances sweeping reductions. As an ex- 

 ample forty specific names now stand as synonyms of Scolopendra 

 morsita7is. ■* 



1 There is a division among Zoologists as to the orthography of this word. The 

 orthography Myriapoda used above is in accordance with the usage of Newport, 

 Gervais, Lucas, Wood, Meinert, L. Koch, C. Koch, Bergsoe, Porath (eariier papers), 

 Pahnberg, Ryder, Sager, Cope, Fanzago, Saussure, Humbert, Haase and De Borre. 

 The form Myriopoda is used by Karsch, Latzel, Packard, Stuxberg, Butler, Harger, 

 Peters and Porath (later papers). 



2 Gattungen und Arten der Scolopendriden, in Archhi fur NatitrgescJnchti, 

 i88i, 50—132. 



3 Myriapoda Musei Cantabrigensis, Part I Chilopoda, in Proceedings American 

 Phil ical Society, XXI, 1 6 1 — 233 ( 1 885 ) . 



■* Cf the 38 species of 5'r^/i3/£';/(/ra described by Newport in his classic (Trans. 

 Linn. Society, 1844) only eight have not yet been reduced to synonyms. Of the 25 

 species described by Wood, nineteen are not now regarded as valid species and not one 

 of the other six h ! been identified a second time. In the h'ght of these facts it is 

 the part of wisdc. 10 move slowly in the description of new specie'^. 



Entomologica Americana. Vol hi. 10 July, 1887. 



