ON THE GENERIC TYPES OF N. AMERICAN 

 DIURNAL LEPIDOPTERA 



In view of the fact that the 2n(i International Entomological Con- 

 gress is to be held very shortly in Oxford, England, when doubtless 

 many matters relating to the fixing of generic types and other points 

 of nomenclature will be discussed, and as further there has been con- 

 siderable agitation of late concerning the advisability of modifying 

 the Rules of strict priority and allowing certain names of long stand- 

 ing to become valid, even if antedated by other less known names, it 

 has occurred to us that the following paper may prove of value and 

 serve as a basis for discussion. 



Dr. Scudder in the Proc. Am. Acad. Arts & Sci. X, 1875, has 

 attempted to fix the generic types of all the genera of the Diurnal 

 Lepidoptera by the process usually known as elimination. The results 

 of this paper he has later somewhat modified in articles in the Buffalo 

 Bulletin Nos. 2 and 3, but in the main his system has been followed 

 by Dyar in his List of N. Am. Lepidoptera (Bull. 52 U. S. Nat. Mus.). 

 As a result many well-known generic terms, e. g. Pieris, Colias, 

 Mclitaca, Lycacna, etc., have disappeared. 



As at the present time, some of our most noted systematists advo- 

 cate the "first species" principle in fixing the type of a genus where no 

 type is specified, a principle that appears to us to be the safest and 

 sanest of any at present in use, it has occurred to us to apply this prin- 

 ciple to the various Diurnal Genera of N. America and see what the 

 result would be. Taking Dyar's Catalogue as a basis we have in the 

 following list compared the results of the two methods of fi.xing the 

 generic types as far as the N. Am. Diurnal Lepidoptera are concerned ; 

 in the Hespcridac we have omitted a large number of genera, mostly 

 those of Scudder, in which the type has been specified, and have 

 only included a few in which a radical change would be brought about 

 by using the "first species" plan. 



One important question brought out in preparation of this list 

 is that of the validity of Hubner's Tentamen (1801). Already a 

 quantity of ink has been spilled in discussing this subject and as yet 

 no definite result has been attained. A ruling by an International 



