Hemiechinus Fitzinger, 1866 . Sitzb. Akad. Wiss. Wien, 54, 1:565.

TYPE SPECIES: Erinaceus platyotis Sundevall, 1842 (= Erinaceus auritus Gmelin, 1770).

SYNONYMS: Ericius, Erinaceolus, Macroechinus, Paraechinus .

COMMENTS: Regarded as a subgenus of Erinaceus by Gureev (1979: 168) and Gromov and Baranova (1981:9). Corbet (1978c:15) considered Hemiechinus a distinct genus, later reviewed by Corbet (1988), who included Mesechinus, see comments therein. Pavlinov and Rossolimo (1987:12- 13) included Paraechinus in Hemiechinus as a valid subgenus, as did Frost et al. (1991:27), while Corbet (1988) argued for a generic separation of Paraechinus . The taxonomy of this group is unsettled, and different opinions about generic and specific boundaries still exist.