Abstract
The fossil record of Darwin wasps (Ichneumonidae) is extremely understudied relative to their enormous extant diversity, with only around 300 species described. Moreover, the taxonomic placement of many of the fossils is based on an outdated classification system. We here revise 18 ichneumonid fossils, all described before the most comprehensive revision of ichneumonid classification by Henry Townes. After a careful reinterpretation of character evidence, we leave the original placement of only five fossils, while expressing uncertainty about the placement of two of them, Pimpla ? seyrigi Theobald and Polysphincta ? inundata Brues, by following the principles of open nomenclature. In addition, we move Parapimpla rhenana Theobald, 1937 stat. rev. from Pimplinae to Ctenopelmatinae. We describe a new phygadeuontine genus to accommodate two fossils previously described in Pimplinae, Armadilleon morticinus (Brues) gen. et comb. nov. and A. petrorum (Brues) gen. et comb. nov. Finally, we change the genus and, almost always, the subfamily placement for ten fossils: Hallocinetus ? arvernus (Piton) comb. nov., Dimophora ? longicornis (Theobald) comb. nov., Dimophora ? wickhami (Cockerell) comb. nov., Lycorina ? indura (Theobald) comb. nov., Acerataspis ? revelata (Brues) comb. nov., Hypsicera ? solidata (Brues) comb. nov., Orthocentrus ? mortuaria (Brues) comb. nov., Zagryphus tilloyi (Theobald) comb. nov., Lithoserix antiquus (Saussure) comb. nov. and Monoblastus ? senilis (Brues) comb. nov. Our revision highlights the need for the re-interpretation of perhaps a majority of ichneumonid fossils and for widely adopting the open nomenclature framework. This framework allows uncertainty in fossil classification to be expressed in an intuitive and explicit manner, which contributes to alleviating misinterpretation of the palaeontological literature, for instance in phylogenetic dating studies.
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