was usually circumscribed to include three distinct groups in the Laurales, which are recognized in the APG III system as the separate families Siparunaceae, Atherospermataceae, and Monimiaceae sensu stricto. The inclusion of Amborella and Trimenia was always doubtful and was rejected by many. Their exclusion from the Monimiaceae was well established by the time Philipson wrote his treatise on the family. Beginning with the ground-breaking paper by Mark W. Chase and many coauthors in 1993, the cladistic analysis of DNA sequences has contributed much to the knowledge of angiosperm phylogeny. By the end of the 1990s, it was evident that the traditional circumscription of Monimiaceae was paraphyletic over the monotypic family Gomortegaceae, and possibly polyphyletic, as well, because the major part of it formed a clade with the Hernandiaceae and Lauraceae. Among the Hernandiaceae, Monimiaceae, and Lauraceae, the question of which two are most closely related has been remarkably difficult to answer. Different studies have yielded different results, but none with strong statistical support. This is surprising, in view of the fact that the Hernandiaceae and Lauraceae are much closer to each other morphologically than either of them is to the Monimiaceae. Systematics In 1993, Philipson divided the subfamily Mollinedioideae into three tribes: Hedycaryeae, Mollinedieae, and Hennecartieae. The Hennecartieae consisted of a single species: Hennecartia omphalandra. It is now known that Hennecartia is nested within the Mollinedieae and is sister to a clade consisting of the rest of the neotropical Monimiaceae. The family Mollinedieae is strongly supported as monophyletic if Hennecartia is included. The monophyly of the Hedycaryeae is not supported or rejected by either of the recent molecular phylogenetic studies. One study resolved Xymalos as sister to the rest of the Mollinedioideae, but this result had only weak maximum likelihood bootstrap support. In the next revision of the Monimiaceae, several genera will need to be recircumscribed or placed in synonymy with others. Tetrasynandra and Grazielanthus are embedded within Steganthera and Mollinedia, respectively. Kibaropsis forms a clade with Hedycarya arborea, the type species of Hedycarya. The monophyly of Levieria is questionable, but only one species has been sampled for DNA. Levieria acuminata is nested within Hedycarya. Wilkiea, meanwhile, is polyphyletic and should be divided into at least three genera. The type species, W. calyptrocalyx is now regarded as a synonym of Wilkiea huegeliana, and the latter is placed by some authors in synonymy with Wilkiea macrophylla. References Sources Philipson, W.