F ROM the t ime of their earliest descript ion in the late 18th century , ~ meningiomas have been considered indolent relatively benign tumors which, when their location is favorable, can be completely removed. Yet Simpson 2~ repor ted recurrences in ~ 1 ~ of ~65 surgical cases; half of these were in pat ients in whom radical removal had been considered complete. He emphasized the invasive proper t ies of these tumors, including limited infi l tration of the brain in 4 % of his cases, and alluded to two examples of definite mal ignancy. This propensi ty for vigorous act ivi ty which m a y progress to f rank mal ignancy was recognized as long ago as 18582 In 19~7, Craig 6 reviewed 56 cases of intracranial meningiomas, and found 11 mal ignan t variants. Cushing and E i senhard t described six examples in their series of 313 meningiomas. 7 Turner , et al., 26 in a s tudy of 370 intracranial meningeal tumors , found 36 wi th mal ignant characteristics. Moreover, extracranial n le tas tases of meningiomas may o c c u r . 2'7'I0'11'13'14'16'17'21-23'25 ~nteresting]y enough, in some of these cases the microscopic appea rance of bo th the p r ima ry and me tas t a t i c t um or s was tha t of a benign mening ioma? '11'~5'26 Still another mal ignant var ian t of the same fundamenta l pathological process is the diffuse, generalized, meningeal meningiomatosis . 4'5' s,~s,27 Our report concerns the sol i tary intracranial meningioma which, because of its microscopic appearance t aken in conjunction with its gross character is t ics and behavior, is deemed to be mal ignant .