Talk:Notoptera

The wrong page redirects here but I don't know how to fix it

A search for 'Grylloblattodea' leads you to this superorder of insects but I think should be linking directly to the order Grylloblattidae: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grylloblattidae. How can I correct this? Chrishikes (talk) 05:39, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

The redirect's target was changed from that article to here with a reason in this edit: . The page with the redirect disabled is here: GrylloblattodeaGrylloblattodea - FifthFive (talk) 05:46, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

Reduce Notoptera to an order?

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notoptera suggests that Notoptera is an order, potentially reducing Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea to suborders

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantophasmatidae suggests the same with sources: "Recent evidence indicates a sister group relationship with Grylloblattidae (classified in the order Grylloblattodea), and Arillo and Engel have combined the two groups into a single order, Notoptera, with Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea ranked as suborders." Diederikvdv (talk) 19:10, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

This is already explained in the "History of research" section. People cannot agree whether to treat it as an order with two suborders, or a superorder with two orders. This dispute may never be resolved, as both sides seem unwilling to concede. It is especially contentious since one of the authors involved, Engel, anonymously edits Wikipedia to promote his own version (i.e., where Notoptera is an order). Dyanega (talk) 21:04, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

For reference, it was this edit that changed Notoptera to a superorder, based on the Grylloblattodea Species File. There is no explanation in the Grylloblattodea Species File website as to why they adopted this ranking. Note that from page creation in 2008 to 2023, it was an order, so the change to superorder is very recent, and there are no published sources given to support it - only the Grylloblattodea Species File. Dyanega (talk) 21:19, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

Also, the most recent publication I can find, here, treats Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea as suborders. I would support reverting the automatic taxobox back to order, but doing this may entail a lot of "collateral damage" in the affected articles, so should be done with caution. The paper I just linked would be the source to cite. Dyanega (talk) 21:35, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

I see that this 2025 paper also created yet another new family within Grylloblattodea. As things stand, the incompatibility of the two systems (the one used by Engel and his collaborators, versus the Grylloblattodea Species File) make it difficult to produce a consensus classification for use in Wikispecies and Wikipedia. Dyanega (talk) 21:56, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

@Diederikvdv @Dyanega (Just reading this now a bit belatedly):

Hi, I was the one who changed en.wiki to treat Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea as orders rather than suborders of Notoptera. For some context, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Insects/Archive 4#Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea. Regarding Notoptera in particular, admittedly at the time I was a bit unsatisfied (and still am now) calling Notoptera a superorder when only Grylloblattodea Species File called it one, but as you can see from the discussion, since me and Jts1882 at least agreed that Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea should be treated as orders based on the sources (which don't all support lumping them into a single order at present, and it's not just Grylloblattodea Species File at all), it was clear something had to be done about Notoptera and its order rank. In hindsight, I wonder if I should also have advocated for retitling the Notoptera article "Xenonomia" and ranking it a clade, since at least some researchers other than Engel seem to prefer that name so I understand?

Note that besides the paper Dyanega linked (which was co-authored by Engel), there was also another paper on fossil insects published earlier in the same month that called Grylloblattodea an order (though with no mention of Xenonomia or Notoptera). As it happens, this and the Engel paper share one of the coauthors, André Nel. Another paper from last year however talks about Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea as orders of a clade Xenonomia, though in its supplemental material it proposes some new clade names to attempt resolve the unfortunate mess concerning the nomenclature and definition of Grylloblattodea/Grylloblattida/Notoptera. (If I'm being honest, I'm not sure if "Icaroptera" will catch on as a clade name for just extant Grylloblattidae in place of Grylloblattodea, but I cannot predict the future.)

In short, to my understanding this is actually part of a both nomenclatural and taxonomical can of worms that goes beyond just "Engel vs Grylloblattodea Species File". I honestly don't know what the solution is myself, but personally I don't think it's reverting back to calling Notoptera an order, because first the sources need to support this being the consensus. Monster Iestyn (talk) 03:16, 7 November 2025 (UTC)

I've recently been in contact with the manager of the Grylloblattodea Species File, and she has reviewed the situation, and decided to treat Notoptera as an order, with Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea as suborders. In a sense, this would seem to shift things a bit, as the Species Files are fairly authoritative. Dyanega (talk) 18:06, 10 November 2025 (UTC)

Well now... I'm still unsure we should be treating Grylloblattodea and Mantophasmatodea as suborders again, but for the time being there is clearly no reason to call Notoptera a superorder anymore in that case. (I've already changed the taxobox template to call it a clade for the time being) Monster Iestyn (talk) 21:51, 10 November 2025 (UTC)