ABSTRACT
Pronotum generally narrower than base of elytra, narrowest at apex in most; sides not carinate or margined, surface smooth, punctate, or rugose; pleural region large; prosternum short; procoxal cavities large, confluent, open behind. Mesosternum triangular, more or less modified anteriorly in the Old World tribe Mylabrini; mesocoxal cavities confluent. Metasternum long or (in wingless forms) short. Legs with anterior coxae prominent, contiguous; middle coxae prominent, contiguous, hind coxae transverse, nearly contiguous; trochanters large, triangular, in some modified in male; profemora subcylindrical, or with an apicoventral excavation with silky pubescence (most Epicautini); tibiae mostly elongate, variously modified in male of several taxa, with two distinct apical spurs, one on the protibiae of males in some; hind tibial spurs often dissimilar, the external one commonly spoon-like and in some greatly enlarged; tarsal formula 55-4; tarsi slender, bilobed only in the Tetraonycinae and some tropical Eleticinae, most with narrow pads beneath segments; tarsi of male modified in several species of Meloinae; claws each subtended by a ventral blade which is rarely reduced to a filiform appendix or fused basally to the dorsal blade (claw) and forming a tooth, ventral blade microsetate in the Eleticinae, in some Lyttini, and in two species of North American Zonitis (Nemognathinae); dorsal blade often with a double or single row of teeth on ventral margin (particularly in the Nemognathinae). Elytra entire or shortened, rarely overlapping at suture; apex of elytra with a pit-like organ in males of several Eleticinae; epipleural fold small. Wings normal, rarely reduced, or absent, in rare cases (Cordylospasta) absent only in female; venation without radial vein and cell; the most primitive wing (in Eleticinae) includes a 2A2 vein which may be interrupted at base.
