12 
Preface. By Dr. A. Seitz. 
Madagascar more minutely, however, with respect to the entomic fauna this relationship to the Indian Fauna 
is by no means so close and amazing as it might have seemed at first. Certainly many genuine Ethiopian lepidop- 
teral groups are entirely absent in Madagascar, but probably above all for the reason that the part of the island 
which was hitherto explored does not possess any real savannas, so that the vast multitude of animals occurring 
in the African steppes does not exist here. On the other hand, however, there are still singular groups, such 
as the genus Chrysiridia, common to both Madagascar and the continent opposite it. Nor is Papilio anterior, 
from Madagascar, particularly closely allied to the Indian Pharmacophagus, and the Pemphigostola, which 
at first was taken to be closely allied with the Indo-Australian Synemon, has of late been considered to be 
ralated with the (chiefly African) Agaristidae. Nevertheless the district of Madagascar with its satellite islands 
and the Comoro Is., Seychelles, Amirante Is., Mascarene Is., Reunion and Mauritius abounds in peculiarities 
also with respect to its Heterocera. 
The range of single families of the Heterocera in the Ethiopian region has already been mentioned in 
the Preface to Vol. XIII. p. 5 to 7. In the meantime our knowledge, particularly of the Central African Fauna, 
has considerably improved, though some species are of such a peculiar nature that it is still very difficult 
to range them within the families having been hitherto established. 
Pemphigostola and Apoprogenes, for instance, are such forms not rangeable into any of the families 
of Heterocera known to this day. We therefore place them to the beginning of this volume. Hampson combines 
both in one special family, whilst Strand places the former as a separate subfamily to the Castniidae; in case 
this latter enlistment is considered to be wrong (as other modern authors do), the Castniidae have no represen¬ 
tatives known at all in the Ethiopian Region. 
As to the Zygaenidae, we have already mentioned in Vol. XIII that several subfamilies of them 
occur in the Ethiopian Region. The Himantopterini with their peculiarly changed hindwings which are sometimes 
reduced to linear stripes are widely distributed in tropical Africa, although the single species are apparently 
localized and confined to parts of the country that are interspersed with termitaries. The Chalcosiina s. however, 
which were mentioned in Vol. XIII as being absent in Africa, with but one exception, are according to recent 
investigations not at all represented in the Ethiopian Region, since the exception mentioned above has proved 
to be due to an error in literature. •— Of the Phaudinae, however, of which scarcely a dozen forms are known 
in the Indo-Australian Fauna, there occur twice as many species in the Ethiopian Region. Most of the Ethiopian 
Phaudinae, however, differ rather much in the habitus from the Indo-Australians. -— The subfamily of Pom- 
postolinae with their 30 forms are purely African. The Zygaeninae, finally, containing more than a hundred 
forms, which are entirely inferior to the Chalcosiinae in the Indo-Australian Region, occur in the Ethiopian 
Region in numerous forms quite similar to the palearctic Zygaena, and can sometimes scarcely be separated 
generically from their South-European allies. Here we also find some resemblances in the habitus with Synto¬ 
midae occurring at the same habitat, in quite a similar way as between races of the European Zygaena ephialtes 
and Syntomis phegea. 
The Syntomidae with more than 200 species are almost equal to the number of species in the Indian 
Fauna, but are by far exceeded by America. They generally neither occur in such multitudes as in America 
where sometimes nearly all the blossoms on flowery meadows are occupied by Syntomidae. In the Ethiopian 
Region, however, really gigantic forms are developed, as for instance in the genus Balacra, which attain an 
expanse of about 7 cm; a remarkable fact is that their increasing size produces a predilection to nocturnal habits. 
But there occur also species allied with the two European Syntomidae, and many Ethiopian species of Syntomis, 
Epitoxis, and Apisa approximate the European Syni. phegea, whereas the palearctic Dysauxes are closely allied 
to the Ethiopian Micronaclia, Stictonaclia, Thyrosticta etc. occurring particularly in Madagascar. 
The Arctiidae of the Ethiopian Region have been briefly characterized in Vol. XIII, p. 5. The Litho- 
siinae mostly exhibit, as also often in the other faunae, very small species of an insignificant yellow or grey 
colouring. — The (42) Nolinae, except one, belong to the same genera as their European allies do, from which 
they do not differ much in any respect. As much as we know of the little known larvae, the application of 
head-cases forming a crown-like crest on the vertex seems to refer also to African species, and some Ethiopian 
forms exhibit the same peculiarity also found in other parts of the world, i. e. some parts of the wings showing 
the scales raised into rough pads. — As Hypsinae was considered that division of the large Arctiid family which 
corresponds to the Asota, Agape, Euplocia etc. of the Indian Fauna and to the Pericopinae of the American 
Fauna and which is represented in tropical Africa by a large number of imposing species, which number, however, 
is by far inferior to the species in the Indo-Australian Region (above 150) and in the American Region (about 
350). — The Spilosominae are the most numerous among the Ethiopian Arctiidae, mostly occurring here in 
medium-sized, white, sand-coloured or neutrally coloured forms which are partly quite similar to the Europeans. 
Of the Micrarctiinae resp. Callimorphinae only the very widely distributed (almost cosmopolitan) Utetheisa, 
Argina etc. occur, whereas just the genera containing most species and predominating on the northern hemisphere, 
the Ocnogyna, Phragmatobia etc. are almost entirely absent in the Ethiopian Region. The same is the case 
with the Arctiinae (in a restricted sense), of which we have already mentioned in the Preface (Vol. XIII) that 
