TAXONOMY AND PARATAXONOMY OF 
SOME FOSSIL ANTS 
( H YMENOPTERA-FORMICIDAE ) 1 
By Robert W. Taylor 
Biological Laboratories, Harvard University 
In current revisionary studies of the ant tribe Ponerini it has 
become necessary to re-examine the status of various fossils previously 
placed in the genus P oner a. This taxon dates to 1804 and conse- 
quently has an unusually complex conceptual and nomenclatural his- 
tory. The included fossils require special treatment to unravel their 
part in the resulting snarl. 
Thirty-six fossil ants have been placed as Ponera or Ponera- like 
by earlier authors but little confidence in the generic assignment of 
most of them is possible. Some are certainly ponerine, and occasional 
placement in tribe Ponerini is reasonable. Most species, however, 
cannot be satisfactorily placed, even to subfamily. The fact is that, 
to some authors. Ponera has served as a “catch-all” for small, possibly 
ponerine ant fossils, or wing impressions with venation similar to 
that of Ponera. 
It is proposed here to review these species and to attempt their 
allocation into various categories: (1) Formicidae incertae generis; 
(2) Ponerinae incertae generis; (3) Ponera; (4) (?) Ponera; or 
(5) the form-genus Poneropsis Heer, 1867 — as redefined below. 
The result of sorting the fossil “Ponera" in this way has, I believe, 
some utility relative to evolutionary studies. Species are either placed 
definitely or reasonably certainly in a known taxon, rendered 
“incertae" at the level at which they begin to be uncertain in diag- 
nostic features ; or allocated to the phylogenetically meaningless limbo 
of the parataxon Poneropsis. My category “(?) Ponera" in general 
contains species equally well placed in Ponera or Hypoponera 2 , al- 
though smaller members of other genera of tribe Ponerini may be 
included. 
'Based on research supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation, 
Grant No. GB 1634. 
2 Santschi’s subgenus Ponera ( Hypoponera ) (1938, Bull. Soc. Ent. France, 
43: 8-80) has recently been elevated to full generic status (Taylor, mss.). 
It contains the majority of the living species currently assigned to Ponera, 
and many of its species are superficially Ponera-Wke. 
Manuscript received by the Editor May 29, 1964. 
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