Subfamily Nesomyinae Major, 1897 . Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1897:718.

SYNONYMS: Brachytarsomyes, Brachyuromyes, Eliuri, Gymnuromyinae .

COMMENTS: Group exceedingly diverse morphologically, defying an unambiguous diagnosis and questioning their monophyletic origin (see discussion in Carleton and Musser, 1984). Proponents of a single ancestral origin have usually arranged nesomyines as a subfamily of Cricetidae (e.g., Miller and Gidley, 1918; Simpson, 1945) or as a subfamily within a broadly defined family Nesomyidae, which includes other archaic groups like cricetomyines, tachyoryctines, and Mystromys (Chaline et al., 1977; Lavocat, 1978). Ellerman (1941, 1949a) argued that nesomyines are polyphyletic and dispersed the seven genera among four subfamilies of Muridae sensu lato, as reflected in the family-group synonyms all named by Ellerman (1941). Lavocat (1978) viewed Protarsomys, lower Miocene of Kenya, as close to the ancestry of Malagasy Nesomyinae, and Chaline et al. (1977) placed the Miocene fossil in synonymy under extant Macrotarsomys . Carleton and Schmidt (1990) disputed this relationship and generic equivalence; nesomyines otherwise known only from the Holocene of Madagascar.

Ellerman (1949a) provided the most valuable synopsis of nesomyine taxa and set forth the basic species-level classification currently recognized; taxonomy updated by Petter (1972c, 1975a). Locality data, geographic ranges, and type localities of named forms summarized by Carleton and Schmidt (1990). Revisionary and ecological studies required for all genera.