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Page count: 118

Polyneoptera is an assemblage of eleven insect orders comprising the "orthopteroid" insects. It includes familiar insects such as grasshoppers, roaches, termites, earwigs and preying mantises; as well as the more obscure web-spinners, angel insects and ice-crawlers. We present a phylogenetic analysis of the polyneopteran orders based on 18S rDNA, 28S rDNA, Histone 3, and a coded morphology matrix for an extensive sampling of taxa. We investigate the use of congruence between separate datasets as an a priori measure of alignment quality. Our results support the paraphyly of Polyneoptera, the monophyly of Dictyoptera, sister taxon relationships between Embiidina + Phasmatodea and Dermaptera + Zoraptera, and a relatively basal placement of Plecoptera. The analyses also support a sister taxon relationship between the newly described Mantophasmatodea and Grylloblattodea, a small order of cryophilic insects confined to the northwestern Americas and northeastern Asia. This placement coupled with the morphological disparity of the two groups validates the creation of a new order for Mantophasmatodea. Our results also suggest the Direct Optimization (formerly Optimization Alignment) produces alignments that are more predictable across the parameter landscape than alignment via CLUSTAL X, as measured by congruence among independent data partitions.