Oh, yes, now I remember - it *has* to be that way, otherwise upcalls from subclass __new__ methods don't do the right thing (int.__new__(MyInt), etc), just as you need to pass the current type in explicitly for cooperative super calls. This is perhaps *the* most obscure design detail of the type system that I'm aware of - I have to go scratching around in my brain for the reason every time it comes up, which is fortunately almost never :)