First clown beetle (Coleoptera: Histeridae) from Middle Miocene Mexican amber

The polyphagan family of clown beetles (Coleoptera: Histeridae) is represented by over 4,800 species with worldwide distribution. It is well-known for the diversity of exploited habitats and remarkable morphological adaptations, which evolved in relation to habitat shifts (Kovarik & Caterino, 2016). The origin of the family has been estimated to the mid-Jurassic based on phylogenomic analyses (Kusý et al., 2025). The earliest known fossils appeared in the Cretaceous Period, with the oldest fossils from the Lower Cretaceous Hkamti amber (ca. 110 Ma) of northern Myanmar (Caterino & Yamamoto, 2023; Simon-Pražák et al., 2024). There are currently over 50 described fossil species of clown beetles with most of them found in Cretaceous and Eocene ambers. Only a single species has been formally described from the Miocene age ambers (i.e., Trypanaeus hispaniolus Chatzimanolis et al., 2006; from Middle Miocene Dominican amber of the Dominican Republic).