Philanthus rutilus Spinola, 1839

Figs 13A–C, 14A–C.

Philanthus rutilus Spinola, 1839: 488, ♀, ♁.

Diagnosis. Body length: 12.4 mm (female); 12.5 mm (male).

Body relatively large, with body in female predominantly black, with tegula, scutellum, posterior margins of T 3–5 and legs ferruginous; clypeus and lower face yellow not reaching middle ocellus (Figs 13A, 14A). Male with clypeus and face whitish, whitish extending to middle ocellus; thorax entirely black (tegula yellow), gaster with T 1 ferruginous, while T 2 and T 3 yellow, with intersegments and base of T 1 black; T 4 &T 5 almost black (with very thin, hardly seen yellow streaks postero-laterally), F3–11 black; face and clypeus ivory white (Figs 13B, 14B, C).

Face and clypeus with dense, fine and long pilosity (Fig. 14A–C), male clypeal moustache dense, ending very close to each other but not, or hardly joining medially (Fig. 14B); malar space insignificant (Fig. 14C); mandible coarsely longitudinally ridged (Fig. 14A); thorax with dense pilosity but shorter than on head (Fig. 14C); thoracic sterna with dense and longer fine pilosity; upper mesopleuron (mesepimeron) densely punctate, sculpture on lower mesopleuron (mesepisternum) greatly masked by long and dense pilosity (Fig. 14C); propodeum with median, somewhat broad median groove, lateral surface shiny but with some points (Fig. 13C).

Material examined: 1♁, Wadi Al Awsag, 16.12.1930, det. Mochi (PPDD) ; 1♁, Mataria, 1.iv.1917 (AUCE) ; 1♁, Wadi Morrah, 7.iv.1925 (AUCE) ; 1♁, Kafr Hakim, 20.iii.1926 (AUCE) ; 1♁, Kafr Farouk, 12.ii.1929 (AUCE) ; 1♀, Pyramids, 4.iii.1931 (AUCE) ; 1♁, Kafr Gammus, 17.ii.1935 (AUCE) ; 2♁, El Gabal El Asfar, 7.ii.1937 (AUCE) ; 3♁, 1♀, Kafr Farouk, 26.ii.1939 (AUCE) ; 1♁, Kafr Farouk, 20.ii.1939 (AUCE)

Previous Egyptian Records: No specific locality (Spinola 1839, 1843 as P. byssinus; Dalla Torre 1897; Mellor 1928 as P. rutilans; Mochi 1939; de Beaumont 1949, 1956, 1960, 1961 all as P. rutilus rutilus; Bohart & Menke 1976 as P. rutilus rutilus), near Giza (Pyramids) (A. Costa 1875), Maadi (Storey 1916 as P. rutilans), El Gabal El Asfar, Kafr Farouk (Honoré 1942; Roche 2007), Abu Rawash, Ameriah, Dahshour, El Marg, Wadi Awsag (Gadallah 1996 as P. rutilus rutilus), Gebel Elba (Gadallah 1996; Dollfuss 2017), Beni Yussef (Roche 2007).

Extralimital distribution: Algeria, Chad, Israel-Palestine, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Spain, United Arab Emirates, Yemen.

Remarks. The characters of our specimens agree with the North African specimens of de Beaumont (1949: 178, couplet 3), and with the Arabian specimens of Guichard (1994: 208, couplet 2).