The phylogeny of this group of beetles is very much debated. Most recent
authors subdivide the former Melyridae sensu lato into several
families, e.g. Melyridae sensu stricto, Dasytidae and Rhadalidae. I do
not adopt this view here in Zoographia Germaniae for the following reasons. The
internal relationships of the "Melyrid assemblage" are not resolved; so
far neither morphological nor genetic studies have produced stable and
congruent phylogenetic trees. The study by Bocakova et al. 2012
shows that the internal branching pattern of the Melyrid beetles varies
depending on the phylogenetic method used. Thus, it is currently not
possible to define separate families. Only the monophyly of the entire
assembly is evident from the available data. Until the
interrelationships of the melyrid groups is resolved with more
confidence, I do not adopt the splitting of the Melyridae into separate
families and retain them as a single large family Melyridae. However,
this concept of Melyridae is paraphyletic with respect to the Malachiidae:
to obtain a monophyletic family, the Melyridae (sensu lato) and the
Malachiidae must be combined into a single family. Because the
Malachiidae are currently widely used at family rank I refrain from
combining these two families and provisionally retain a paraphyletic
Melyridae and the most derived melyrids as a separate Malachiidae.
Clearly, more research is needed here to clarify the phylogeny of the
Melyridae and related groups of beetles, and to define monophyletic
families.
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