The Rhynchium species of the Philippine Islands (Hymenoptera, Eumenidae)

It has generally been accepted that the Philippine Islands are inhabited by only a single species of the Eumenid genus Rhynchium. In Miss Baltazar's valuable catalogue (1966) it is listed as a subspecies, atrum Saussure, of R. haemorrhoidale (Fabr.). However, when in 1963 I examined an extensive collection of Eumenidae from these islands in the U.S. National Museum, Washington ), the available material of this genus proved to consist of two very similar, though readily separable, species. The question thus arose, to which of these should be applied the name atrum Saussure. This species was described from "Les Indes Orientales, les Iles de la Sonde, la Nouvelle Guinée [Warou]. (Musée de Paris)". Unfortunately I did not find any specimens of this certainly rather heterogeneous series in the Paris Museum, and I therefore had to rely on a comparison of my material with the original description. It appeared that this description is almost certainly based on one or more specimens from the Philippine Islands, for it applies better to one of my two Philippine species than to any other of a great number of forms from various parts of the Oriental region. In order to establish the identity of R. atrum with certainty, however, I have considered it desirable to designate a neotype for this species. The material discussed in this paper is preserved in the following collections. AMNH = American Museum of Natural History, New York, U.S.A. BISH = Bernice P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A. BPI = Bureau of Plant Industry, Manila, Philippines. CNHM = Chicago Natural History Museum, Chicago, Ill., U.S.A.