Annals of the Transvaal Museum 
245 
THE SCOLOPENDRIDAE OF SOUTH AFRICA 
By C. S. Grobbelaar, Stellenbosch. 
With 28 Text figures. 
Introduction. 
I have undertaken the specific determination of the South African Scolopen- 
dridae in order to bring this apparently neglected group on a level with those 
leading Arthropodan divisions that have received considerable attention in 
the past from leading authorities. The interested reader will notice that not a 
single new genus or species has been established. Here and there I have been 
tempted to establish a new species; but the range of variation in a single 
species is so considerable in the Scolopendridae that I have thought it advisable 
to adhere to the determination of the previous workers on the group. Kraepelin, 
who recognised this phenomenon only too clearly, made provision for it in his 
diagnoses of the species. He, more than anybody else, is responsible for the 
systematic work on our South African Scolopendridae . 
I am deeply indebted to the Director of the Transvaal Museum, Pretoria, 
and Mr John Hewitt, Director of the Albany Museum, Grahamstown, for 
placing their entire collections of Scolopendridae at my disposal. I am specially 
grateful to Mr John Hewitt for the many suggestions he proposed and which 
have been given effect to in preparing the manuscript. 
Probably four-fifths of the South African Chilopoda are included in the 
family Scolopendridae. In his monograph: Myriopoda Africae Australis, in 
Museo Regio Holmiensi asservata, recensuit i 8 yi , C. O. von Porath founded a 
new genus and several new species of Scolopeiidrids. His monograph is the first 
definite contribution to our knowledge of the South African Chilopoda. In it 
were recorded and described Scutigera capensis Cempleton, and Scutigera 
rugosa Newport; a new species Henicops africana of the Lithobiidae; and 
several new species of Scolopendrids belonging to the genera Scolopendra, 
Cormocephalus, Eucorybus, Heterostoma and Trematoptychus were described. 
The genera Heterostoma Newport and Dacetum C. L. Koch have been included 
in the single genus. 
Ethmostigmus Pocock; Eucorybus Lucas has been supplanted by Alipes 
Imhoff ; and Trematoptychus Peters by Rhysida Wood. 
Pocock raises the Scolopendrids to the order Scolopendromorpha, in which 
all the eyebearing forms are placed in the family Scolopendridae, with two 
sub-families, Alipinae and S colop endrinae. The forms without eyes are re- 
ferred to several families; the most important of these are the three families 
Cryptopidae, Scolocryptopidae and Newportiidae. These three families are 
included in Kraepelin’s sub-family, the Cryptopinae. Kraepelin regards 
Cryptops as the least specialised form, and, in virtue of the following char- 
acters, uses it as a basis of classification. The characters are: uni-segmented 
tarsals ; absence of eyes ; slight differentiation of the segments of the antennae ; 
nature of the pleurae; armour of the anal legs. He divides the Scolopendrids 
into the three sub-families : 
1. Cryptopinae. 
2. Otostigminae. 
3. S colop endrinae. 
