THE LOWER PERMIAN INSECTS OF KANSAS. PART 12. 
PROTORTHOPTERA (CONTINUED), NEUROPTERA, 
ADDITIONAL PALAEODICTYOPTERA, AND 
FAMILIES OF UNCERTAIN POSITION* 
By Frank M. Carpenter 
Museum of Comparative Zoology 
Harvard University 
Cambridge, Mass. 02138 
The three preceding parts in this series have dealt with families 
of Protorthoptera and Orthoptera occurring in the insect beds in 
Elmo, Kansas. The present paper includes a few other families 
of Protorthoptera, the first family of the Order Neuroptera, a 
new family of Palaeodictyoptera, and a series of five families that 
I have been unable to assign to any known order. Most of these 
fossils were collected in the Harvard quarry in 1927 and during the 
intervening fifty years I have studied them many times over in 
attempts to determine their relationships. It now seems advisable 
to describe them formally, even though some uncertainties still 
exist. 
Order Protorthoptera 
As our knowledge of Permian insects increases, it becomes ob- 
vious that orthopteroids were the predominant types of insects 
during the entire period. The Blattaria and Miomoptera were 
abundant as individuals and probably also as species; the Protely- 
troptera and Orthoptera, although not so numerous, represent 
very different structural and environmental divergences. The rest 
of the Permian orthopteroids (apart from the enigmatic Caloneu- 
rodea) have been referred to the Order Protorthoptera — a very 
large, complex, and probably polyphyletic taxon (See Carpenter, 
1966). It is here that the maximum diversity is found. In the Elmo 
'Partial financial support of this research is gratefully acknowledged to the 
National Science Foundation: Grants no. GB3970 and DEB 76-04861, F. M. 
Carpenter, Principal Investigator, Harvard University. I am also indebted to the 
authorities of the Peabody Museum, Yale University, and the Institute of Paleon- 
tology, Academy of Sciences, Moscow, USSR, for the loan of several type speci- 
mens; and to Miss Carol Robey, Radcliffe College, for assistance with the drawings. 
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