IntroductionThe last eight years I have investigated a great number of bean crosses: over 70 between 26 different types or races. In 19341 published the analysis of the cross of ,,Wagenaar" with ,,Fijne tros". In order to bring my later results in connection with this first analysis I have crossed both races with most of the other types: Wagenaar with 21, Fijne tr0s with 17. From the beginning it has been my endeavour to draw a parallel between the extensive results of a few earlier investigators (e.g. VoH TSCHERMAK, SHAW and NORTON, SIRKS, KOOIMAN, TJEBBES, LAMPRECHT) and my own analyses. And, if possible, to bring all these investigations in one and the same factorial scheme for the (seedcoat) colour inheritance. KOOIMAN (I920) and LAMPRECHT (I, 1932) have proved that the genetic factors for the inheritance of seedcoat colour in Phaseolus are of three different types.a. Ground/actor (KooIMAN: ferment factor; LAMPRECHT: fundamental gene). This factor must be dominant (homozygously or heterozygously) for the seedcoat to be able to produce colour. If this groundfactor, which I call P (SHULL, 1907, p. 829) is recessive, the seedcoat and also the flowers are white (About a second ,,fundamental gene", Gri gri, cf. LAMPRECHT xIII, 1936 andXIV, 1939 c. Modi/ying /actors (KoOIMAN: intensifiers; LAm~I~ECI~T: modifiers). These factors only influence (modify, intensify) the colonrs produced by co-operation between groundfactor and complementary factor(s). Now there exists a ~tisagreement between the ideas of J(OOIMAN and of LAMPRECI-IT as to the character of certain factors, in this respect that the former considers them modi/ying (and not causing a brown hilumring), the latter complementary, (and causing a brown hilumring). In my own analysis (PRAKKEN, 1934) of the cross of Wagenaar (yellow-seeded) with Fijne tros (white-seeded, pp) it was impossible for me to establish the complementary or modifying character of any of the factors involved in the segregation, because both races have at least one complementary factor in common: the most recessive P colour type in F2 or following generations is not white (i.e. lacking all complementary factors) but of the so-called h i 1 u mr i n g t y p e, with brown hilumring but for the rest with a very pale greyish cream (or whitish) colour. In this article (the first of a series I hope to publish) I intend to deal with these questions.Another much discussed point in the genetics of seedcoat colour in beans is the inheritance of selfcoloured, mottled and striped seed-