14 
Preface. By Dr. A. Seitz. 
As to the Notodontidae of the Ethiopian Region, they have likewise been already mentioned. This 
family is also regarded in different ways; particularly American groups of lepidoptera containing numbers 
of forms have sometimes been placed to the Notodontidae, sometimes to the Eupterotidae, and sometimes they 
were ranged in a separate family. The variability of these conceptions explains the great difference in the 
numbers stated of this family. He who joins the Apatela- group, the green Rosema , perhaps also yet the Pero- 
phoridae or Cymatophoridae with the Notodontidae, will of course come to quite different results from him who 
confines them to the Notodontidae in the conception of the old authors. It has even been suggested to comprise 
the Thaumetopoeidae in the Notodontidae. If we include the African Anaph .e-group and its allies in the Notodon¬ 
tidae ■— as is frequently done •— the number of 200 species, which was stated for Africa as well as India in 
Vol. II (p. 283) as being the approximate number (though in 1911), is by far surpassed to-day. -—• We may 
at the same time rectify here another statement about the African Notodontidae. In Vol. XIII (p. 6) the absence 
of the Dicranura- group, which occurs almost in all the other parts of the world, was reported as a peculiarity 
of the Ethiopian Region. Since that time, however, also Cerura were now ascertained in Tropical Africa *). 
Still one peculiarity prevails: the Ethiopian Cerura argentine has larvae of the usual Dicranurid shape, but 
they are not green as they are everywhere else in the world, but white, with zebra-like black spots. 
The Thyrididae and Aegeriidae already form the transition to the ,,Microlepidoptera“. They may 
number about 150 species together in the Ethiopian Region; the Aegeriidae frequently exhibit beautiful colours 
often with a golden gloss. As in other districts, the Sesiae also in Africa seem to be frequently influenced by 
mimicry, which is distinctly shown by their copying the coverings of pollen on bees' legs (genus Melittia). 
The subterraneous or endophagous groups of the Cossidae, Zeuzeridae, Arbelidae are represented in 
the Ethiopian Region by somewhat more than 100 species, whilst the Chrysopoloniidae of which about 20 forms 
are known are entirely confined to this district. Thq Limacodidae have not too many representatives, though 
more than twice as many as America, among them the beautiful apple-green Parasa. Most of the African forms 
are dwarfs compared with the large forms of the south-eastern palearctic parts and of the Indian Region from 
the genera Scopelodes and Natada (of which for instance N. vetulina has an expanse of up to 7 cm). 
In Noctuidae the Ethiopian Region abounds more than the Palearctic Region, but it is by far surpassed 
by the Indian and particularly the American Regions. An extraordinarily great number of Noctuae are diurnal 
flyers, part of which swarm in the sunshine, but mostly fly up in front of the wanderer, in order to settle 
down again after a few yards on blades with their heads down. Particularly the Erastrianae (Acontianae) are 
represented by neat and very nicely marked and coloured species. The larger Noctuidae occur more rarely; 
the incessant persecutions by the innumerable bats decimate their numbers enormously. 
The Ethiopian Region is not rich in Geometridae of which we do not know more forms than from 
the palearctic countries. Formerly the large West-African Otroeda were joined with them, the habitus of which 
looks like that of the Indo-Australian Dysphania ( Hazis , Euschema), but which are perhaps more allied to the 
Indian Pterothysanus. However, the inclination for mimicry, which is far spread in the Ethiopian Region and 
which we have tried to explain above, forces even genuine Geometridae (such as the Oenochrominae Aletis and 
Cartaletis) to take part in this freak of nature. 
Of the Microlepidoptera of Africa is generally not yet much known; hardly 3000 species are described; 
except the most primitive microlepidoptera, the Eriocraniidae, none of the known families seems to be absent 
in the Ethiopian Region. 
*) By Arno Schcjltze in: Arcliiv fur Naturgeschichte 82 (1916) A, p. 70. 
