For a hundred years, treatment of the basidiomycetes, which include so many of the larger fungi, has been dominated by the Friesian approach which had—and still has—the attraction of differentiating fungi into groups mainly on field characters.
1965, C. G. Ainsworth, Frederick K[roeber] Sparrow, Alfred S. Sussman, editors, The Fungi: An Advanced Treatise, volume IVB (A Taxonomic Review with Keys: Basidomycetes and Lower Fungi), New York, N.Y., London: Academic Press, page 3