354 
Psyche 
[December 
firmed and some additional features are described, though the risk of 
damage to the specimen precluded dissection of its mouthparts or 
sting. The relationship of Aulacopone to Heteroponera Mayr, sug¬ 
gested by Brown, is supported. This has interesting evolutionary and 
biogeographical implications. 
Taxonomic and Biogeographic Relationships of 
AULACOPONE 
The allocation of Aulacopone to tribe Ectatommini is unquestion¬ 
able, and is further supported by the absence of arolia from the tarsi 
of the available specimen. Within subfamily Ponerinae the absence of 
arolia is apparently unique to species of tribe Ectatommini, except 
Paraponera clavata (Fabricius) (J. Freeland and R. D. Crozier^ers. 
comm .). 
In order to understand in modern terms Arnoldi’s discussion on 
the possible affinities of Aulacopone, the following synonymies by 
Brown are relevant: Gnamptogenys Roger = Alfaria Emery = Stic- 
toponera Mayr; Proceratium Roger = Sysphincta Mayr; Ectatom¬ 
mini = Proceratiini = Stictoponerini.* 
Arnoldi considered Aulacopone close to Gnamptogenys, a genus 
of somewhat diverse content now strongly and disjunctly represented 
(a) in the Indo-Australian area (from Ceylon and Western China to 
the Philippines and Fiji, with one New Guinean species on far north¬ 
ern Cape York Peninsula providing the only known Australian 
records), and (b) in the New World (from Texas south to Tucuman 
and Buenos Aires, including the Antilles and Peru, but as yet not 
Chile). The genus is not known from Africa. Brown recognised 26 
Indo-Australian species, and more are now known. Sixty-four neo¬ 
tropical species were listed by Kempf (1972). One extinct species, G. 
europaeum (Mayr), is known from Oligocene Baltic Amber, and 
according to Brown, Archiponera wheeleri Carpenter, of the North 
American Oligocene Florissant Shale, seems close to Gnamptogenys. 
Arnoldi indicated specific resemblances between A ulacopone and the 
palaeogean “Stictoponera” and neogean “Alfaria” species groups of 
Brown’s Gnamptogenys classification. He considered these three 
taxa, comprising his spurious subtribe Stictoponerini, to represent a 
♦The name Stictoponerini was proposed by Arnoldi (1930); it seems not to have been 
used subsequently, or formally synonymized under Ectatommini, where it belongs 
following Brown’s reclassification. 
