S. Mahunka szerk.: Folia Entomologica Hungarica 27/2. (Budapest, 1974)

cisms were passed over his work, especially over his genera. Posterity, on the other hand, reclaims one after the other his synonymized names. He must have realized the validity of genera intuitively. Several of FÖRSTER's genera may be suppressed considering the European fauna only but at continental or rather more at world level his genera stand up to criticism very well

. Today we may safely say that it was FÖRSTER (1862) who laid the foundation and a very sound one for that matter, the generic systernaties of Braconidae. W. H. ASHMEAD of North America published his system of Hymenoptera in 1900. He was working on the Braconidae of the world excluding the Western Palaearctic. ASHMEAD continued FÖRSTER's work at higher taxa level, i.e. he grouped the known genera into tribes, subfamilies, the majority of them still used today, though in a different sense. He laid special emphasis on the readily distinguishable, unambiguous characters to separate genera. ASHMEAD indeed followed in the footsteps of FÖRSTER whom he esteemed very highly and in the preface of his work he pays tribute to the excellent German Hymenopterologist. It was ASHMEAD who realized that FÖRSTER committed mistakes only when erecting families: today, most of them are either subfamilies or tribes only. ASHMEAD did not attack FÖRSTER by far on this ground, he simply requalified his higher groups and established a well-founded system adding his vast knowledge of Braconidae to the work

. Modern conceptions Today, there are two systematists who further enriched Braconidae classification. Both following the phylogenetical concept elaborated their own system. V.l. TOBIAS (Leningrad) as a taxonomist worked out his system on the basis of the intricate combinations of morphological and aethiological characteristics (TOBIAS 1967 a-b). FoUowing HENNIG (1965) he speaks about piesiomorph (comparatively ancien^ and apomorph (comparatively recent) morphological characters which frequently are coupled with plesio- and apomorph bionomic features. Reflecting on plesio- and apomorph features he establishes evolutionary trends which fill his system of subfamilies and tribes with meaning. M. CAPEK (Banská Stiavnica) a scientist of forestry approached the same problem from the side of bionomics. Partly he reared many braconid species under laboratory conditions, and partly he made ethological observations on the species in various biocenoses and in addition he studied the larval stages of many species from morphological point of view. All these, of course, have been well complemented with a good knowledge of the adults. He worked out his system on the bases of host-specificity, head-capsule structure of the last instar and ethology (CAPEK 1965, 1969, 1970, 1971), which is though not sharply but it is in contradiction with the system based purely in adult morphology. Thus, for example, in the imago systernaties the tribes Hormiini and Pambolini are treated sometimes as independent subfamilies, sometimes as tribes of Rogadinae and Doryctinae, respectively. Contrary to this, from the larva morphological viewpoint it is more justified to bring both under the subfamily of Braconinae

. Furthermore, both from larva morphological and ethological respeots Cheloninae and Triaspiinae taxa are better treated as independent subfamilies and not tribes of a subfamily, with a note appended that Cheloninae show close relations with Microgaste

rinae though their ima-