A review of the singing cicada fossils from the Pliocene Fossil-Lagerstätte Willershausen, Germany, with the description of three new species (Hemiptera: Cicadidae: Tibicinae and Cicadinae)

Abstract

The singing cicada fossils (Cicadidae), based mainly on isolated forewings, from the Pliocene Fossil-Lagerstätte Willershausen, Germany, are reviewed, including previously published material and unpublished specimens from the collections of the Geoscience Museum of the Geoscience Centre at the Georg August University in Göttingen, the State Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart, and the Geoscience Collections of the Clausthal University of Technology, which represent the three largest collections from this outstanding locality. Three new species, Tibicina lata sp. nov., Tibicina boulardi sp. nov. (Tibicinae), and Cicada tithonus sp. nov. (Cicadinae) are described based on forewing characters. Other singing cicadas from Willershausen are assigned to Tibicina sp., Tibicina aff. haematodes, Cicada aff. orni, Cicada aff. lodosi and indeterminable species.