Haris Attila: Hymenoptera Research in the Carpathian Basin - Natura Somogyiensis 29. (Kaposvár, 2016)
Early History of the Aculeata research in Hungary from the 16th till the 19th century (1560–1800)
Haris, A.: Hymenoptera Research in the Carpathian Basin 59 Brancsik's entomological collection including Hymenoptera is deposited in Trencin Museum (according to Koleska 1979) and few specimens were found in Budapest either. Jacques Ernest Edmond André (1844 Beaune - 1891 Beaune), French hymenopter- ologist, who was originally wine merchant but changed his way and soon, he devoted his life to natural history, continuing his career as book editor and scientist. As we know from his paper, published in Természetrajzi Füzetek (Hungary), he was the notary of the town of Gray (Haute-Saone) as well. André was elected to corresponding member of the American Society of Entomology either. His main and well known work, the series of monographs titled "Species de Hyménoptéres d'Europe et d'Algérie". Most of these books were written by himself, but some of them were written by other specialists of various groups of Hymenoptera (like Kieffer or du Buysson). In this monumental series, he published numerous species of Sphecoidea, Mutillidae and Eumenidae from Hungary mostly based on data of Sándor Mocsáry, with him, he was in friendly relationship. He had other Hungarian connection: he identified the Mutillidae collection of the Natural History Department of the Hungarian National Museum, as he wrote about it: "M. Alex. Mocsáry, Conservateur du Musée National de Hongrie, ä Budapest, a bien voulu me communiquer quelques intéressants Hyménoptéres de la Familie des Mittillidae con- servés dans les cartons de cet éta- blissement, en me donnant l'autorisation de décrire les espéces nouvelles qui pourraient s'y rencontrer. C'est le résultat de cette étude que je publie ici, en adressant á M. Mocsáry mes plus sincéres remerciements pour son oblige- ance bien connue, d'ailleurs, de tous les entomologistes." This mutually beneficial connection resulted 2 scientific papers, published in Hungary, one in the Természetrajzi Füzetek (Journals of Nature History) the other in Annales Musei nationalis Hungarici (André 1896, 1908). Unfortunately, all of them were exotic species. André described (perhaps) only one species from the Carpathian Basin, namely Mutilla nigrescens André, 1901 (now Physetopoda scutellaris (Latreille, 1792)), one of the original series is captured in Croatia. This is a very uncertain locality, Northern part of Croatia is part of the Carpathian Basin, but the Southern part is definitely not. August Schletterer (1850 St. Pauls (now San Paolo) at Bolzano - 24th May 1908 Girlan (now Comaiano) at Bolzano). Schletterer attended high school of the Franciscan order. After his military service in Bosnia and Herzegovina, returning home, he started to teach in Bolzano, then at the high school in Horn (Lower Austria) and from 1883 in Vienna. There, Schletterer also worked as volunteer researcher at the Naturhistorisches Hofmuseum. After his appointment in 1890, as high school teacher to Pola, he terminated his activities in entomology. August Schletterer described 3 Chelostoma species from Hungary, namely: Chelostoma ventrale, Ch. handlirschi and Ch. schmiedeknechti (Schletterer 1889a) and 7 Cerceris Latr. species and variations (see them separately) (Schletterer 1887). Further valuable faunistic data on genus Cerceris we may find in his monograph titled: "Nachträgliches über die Hymenopteren-Gattung Cerceris Latr." (Schletterer 1889b). Lajos Bíró (29th August 1856 Tasnád - 2nd September 1931 Budapest), graduated at the Faculty of theology of Debrecen, later continued his studies at Budapest Kalvinist College. During his student years, he visited the Zoological Department of the National Museum where he worked as volunteer. In Aculeata faunistic and zoogeography, he has one paper, titled: "Keleti-Kárpátok vidékének jellemző rovarfajai" (Characteristic insects of Eastern-Carpathian Mts.). Bíró collected there in the autumn of 1883 around
