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Eresus kollari

Subspecies
Other authors recognize six subspecies, Eresus kollari kollari, Eresus kollari bifasciatus Ermolajev, 1937, Eresus kollari frontalis Latreille, 1819, Eresus kollari ignicomus Simon, 1914, Eresus kollari latefasciatus Simon, 1911, and Eresus kollari tricolor Simon, 1873. However, these taxa are either island forms (e.g. from Corsica) or occur at widely separated localities (e.g. Algeria, Russia). Thus, I think that these taxa should better be viewed as well-separated taxa and therefore I regard them here as bonae species. I do not recognize any subspecies of Eresus kollari.

Original description



Synonyms
Aranea nigra Petagna, 1787 (p. 34) (nec Fabricius, 1775; junior homonym) (unclear synonym, see below)
Eresus niger (Petagna, 1787)
Eresus niger niger (Petagna, 1787)
Chersis niger (Petagna, 1787)
Type locality: "Invenitur in planis saltuum Rheginorum, vulgo Aspromonte" (= Reggio Calabria, Italy)
Aranea cinnaberina Olivier, 1789 (p. 221) (unclear synonym, see below)
Aranea cinnaberinus (Olivier, 1789)
Erythrophorus cinnaberinus (Olivier, 1789)
Eresus cinnaberinus (Olivier, 1789)
Type locality: "elle a été prise a Florence" (Florence, Italy).
Aranea moniligera De Villers, 1789 (unclear synonym, see below)
Eresus moniligera (De Villers, 1789)
Type locality: not given. However, the note "Hab. in agris" (= "lives in fields") points to a species that was frequent in local agricultural fields and was known to De Villers from his own experience and not just from dead specimens. And the note "Ex nostr. Mus." (= "from our Museum") also points to a local provenance. Thus, the type locality may be assumed to be Lyon, France.
Aranea quatuorguttata Rossi, 1790 (p. 135) (unclear synonym, see below)
Erythrophorus quatuorguttatus (Rossi, 1790)
Eresus quatuorguttatus (Rossi, 1790)
Type locality: Florence and Pisa (as inferred from book title).
Eresus ater Walckenaer, 1805 (p. 21) (replacement name) (unclear synonym, see below)
Type locality: see Aranea nigra (above).
Chersis dubius Walckenaer, 1837 (p. 392) (unclear synonym, see below)
Type locality: "Dans le royaume de Naples" (Naples, Italy).
Eresus illustris C. L. Koch, 1837 (p. 105) (unclear synonym, see below)
Type locality: unknown. Koch suggests "Vermuthlich ist diese Spinne in Ungarn zu Hause", but Ungarn (= Hungary) in the borders of 1837 might also include type localities outside today´s Hungary.
Eresus kollari Rossi, 1846 (p. 17)
Eresus kollari kollari Rossi, 1846
Type locality: "auf einem Hügel bei Baden", "Wiener Gegend" (Baden, Niederösterreich, near Vienna, Austria)
Eresus fulvus Rossi, 1846 (p. 17) (unclear synonym, see below)
Type locality: "Unteritalien, Dalmatien, die Krim und Syrien" (lower Italy, Dalmatia (Croatia), Crimea (Ukraine), Syria).
Eresus guerinii Lucas, 1846 (p. 133)
Type locality: Tenes, Algeria.
Eresus tristis Kroneberg, 1875
Eresus nigel auct. (misspelling)


Note: the nominal taxa Aranea nigra (and its replacement name Eresus ater), Aranea cinnaberina, Aranea moniligera, Aranea quatuorguttata, Chersis dubius and Eresus illustris have all been regarded as possible senior synonyms of the present species. However, Rezac et al. 2008 argue that these taxa have been described from localities where several similar species are known to occur and that the often short original descriptions are not sufficient to identify the names unambiguously. Thus, these authors regard all of these names as nomina dubia and use Eresus kollari as the valid name, because this is the oldest name that can be unambiguously assigned to the present species. I agree that especially for the Italian fauna the systematics of Eresus are unclear and there may be several novel species that still await formal description. Thus, the taxa described on the basis of Italian specimens (i.e. Aranea nigra and Eresus ater (from Reggio Calabria), Aranea cinnaberina (from Florence), Aranea quatuorguttata (from Florence and Pisa) and Chersis dubius (from Naples)) might indeed refer to hitherto undescribed Italian species. However, Eresus illustris (probably from Austria or Hungary) and Aranea moniligera (probably from Lyon, France) were described from areas where the present species is the only species with red-and-black hindlegs, and thus the names quite confidently apply to the present species. Indeed, all original descriptions (those from Italy, as well as those from Austria/Hungary and France) fit the present species very well and I therefore do not fully agree with the notion of Rezac et al. 2008 that these names are nomina dubia. However, I provisionally accept Eresus kollari as the valid name until a full revision of all Eresus species of the World clarifies the taxonomy of this genus.

Note: Eresus fulvus might be a separate species.

Note: Several authors suggest that the present species is in fact a species-complex of two cryptic species, one species west of the River Elbe and one species east of the River Elbe. Given the huge range of the species from Spain in the west to Central Asia in the east, I think that it is likely that there is some genetic substructuring. However, the basis for the idea of a western and an eastern cryptic species is a phylogenetic analysis of allozyme sequences shown in Fig. 7 in Rezac et al. 2008. This analysis is not suitable to support their claim, because support for most of the nodes in the tree is not statistically significant and these nodes should have been collapsed (leading to the "disappearance" of the two separated groups in the tree). Thus, the notion that two separate species are involved requires more evidence and is currently not corroborated.




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This page has been updated on April 29, 2012
This site is online since May 31, 2005
Copyright © by Nikola-Michael Prpic. All rights reserved.


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