25 
PAPERS READ BEFORE THE SOCIETY. 
THE BRITISH SPECIES OF PERIZOMA (EMMELESIA). 
(Bead February 7th, 1905, by Louis B. PROFIT, F.E.S.) 
The genus Emmelesia, as constituted in the “ Entomologist 
Synonymic List,” consists of the following species: affinitata, Stph.; 
alchemillata, Linn. ; albulata, Schiff. — niveata, Stph. (nec Scop.) ; 
flavofaciata, Thnb. — decolorata, Hh.; taeniata, Stph.; bifaciata, Haw. 
= unifasciata, Haw.; minorata, Tr. — ericetata, Stph.; and blandiata, 
Schiff. = adaequata, Bork. The generic name of Perizoma, Hb., which 
you will find used in oux London List, in our National Collection, and 
in the writings of Warren, is certainly older than the Emmelesia of 
Stephens; its exact dimensions will depend upon the generic characters 
accepted; with Hiibner (Verzeichniss, p. 327) it consisted only of blandiata 
and albulata [niveata), alchemillata going to Calostigia and decolorata 
(ffavofasciata) to Tricliopteryx, while the other four were unknown to 
Hiibner. Stephens’ Emmelesia (Cat. Brit. Ins., ii., p. 147) comprised 
eighteen supposed species, called by him decolorata, alchemillata, 
affinitata, rivulata, nassata, ericetata, albulata, trigonota, blandiata, 
unifasciata, bifasciata, rusticata, rubricata, purpurata, sylvata, candi- 
data, luteata and heparata — purpurata, however, being only included 
with a query ; rubricata and purpurata were removed to Ptychopoda by 
the author in 1831 (III. Haust., iii., p. 308), the second and third 
species merged into one (the true, typical affinitata) and taeniata, n. 
sp. added to the list, resulting in a total of sixteen. The further 
addition of blomeri, Curt., raised the total to seventeen in Humphreys 
and Westwood’s “British Moths,” but no further purification of it 
was effected until Doubleday brought out his “ Zoologist Synonymic 
List,” in which rusticata is made over to Dosithea (on p. 19), sylvata, 
candidata, luteata and blomeri to Acidalia (p. 20), heparata to Eupisteria 
(p. 16), trigonata is sunk, the alchemillata group is reduced from three 
species to two, and it is suggested that unifasciata is a var. of bifaciata, 
which has since proved to be correct; in short, the composition of the 
genus is exactly that to which we have been accustomed for so many 
years. French and German authors had ignored Emmelesia in the 
meanwhile ; but Guenee, in 1857, accepted it in sensu Dbldy. Most 
subsequent workers have again merged it in one of the larger related 
genera; thus Meyrick has all its species in his Hydriomena (Trans. 
Ent. Soc. Land., 1892, p. 72), of which he confesses that it is “a very 
large genus” in which “there is naturally some slight structural 
variation in most details.” The only modern authors who revive 
Perizoma (—Emmelesia ) as a genus are Gumppenberg ( Nova Acta Acad. 
Cues. Nat., liv., 1890, p. 396), where both Hiibner’s original species are 
