Phylogenetic relationships within the Italian species of the lacertid genusPodarciswere examined by parsimony analysis of mitochondrial DNA sequences from the genes encoding the small ribosomal RNA and the phenyl transfer RNA.Lacerta viridiswas used as outgroup andTeira dugesiiwas also included in the ingroup. The 80 phylogenetically informative positions produced four most parsimonious trees, with the ItalianPodarcissplit into three groups: the first comprisedP. filfolensis, P. melisellensis. P. wagleriaria, P. muralis,andP. raffonei,the secondP. siculawith its various subspecies. The third lineage was that ofP. tiliguerta,whose relationships were resolved as more closely related to the first clade, when weighting transversion three times transitions. Bootstrap analyses on a subset of sequences representing all species herein studied, supported the results from the larger dataset. The present results are only partly in agreement with previous hypotheses based on morphology, immunology, and allozyme variation analyses.