Eliomys melanurus (Wagner, 1839)

Mary Ellen Holden, 1993, Order Rodentia - Family Myoxidae, Mammal Species of the World (2 nd Edition), Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, pp. 763-770 : 767

Eliomys melanurus (Wagner, 1839) . Gelehrte Anz. I. K. Bayer. Akad. Wiss., München, 8(37):299.

TYPE LOCALITY: Sinai (restricted to Mt. Sinai by Nader et al., 1983) .

DISTRIBUTION: S Turkey ( Misonne, 1957), Syria (Kahmann, 1981), Iraq (Kahmann, 1981; Nadachowski et al., 1978), Jordan ( Atallah, 1978; Bodenheimer, 1958; Kahmann, 1981; Tristram, 1877), Lebanon (G. M. Allen, 1915; Lewis et al., 1967), Israel ( Bodenheimer, 1958; Hani and Shalmon, 1983; Kahmann, 1981), Saudi Arabia (Kahmann, 1981; Nader et al., 1981; Vesey-Fitzgerald, 1953; also Harrison and Bates, 1991), the Sinai penin. ( Haim and Tchernov, 1974; Osborn and Helmy, 1980; Wassif and Hoogstraal, 1954; Kahmann, 1981), Egypt ( Osborn and Helmy, 1980), Libya ( Ranck, 1968), Tunisia ( Kahmann and Thoms, 1987), Algeria ( Kowalski and Rzebik-Kowalska, 1991), Morocco ( Moreno and Delibes, 1981). Also, in N Africa, see Niethammer (1959).

SYNONYMS: cyrenaicus , denticulatus, larotina, larotinus, munbyanus , occidentalis, tunetae (see Ellerman and Morrison-Scott, 1951; Corbet, 1978c).

COMMENTS: Systematics of Moroccan population examined by Moreno (1989) and Moreno and Delibes (1981); comparative study of African populations by Kahmann and Thoms (1973b); descriptions of type specimens, karyotypes, color plates of skins, and biology of melanurus group provided by Kahmann and Thoms (1981); os penis figured by Didier (1953); biometric study of Tunesian populations by Kahmann and Thoms (1987); chromosomal data provided by Delibes et al. (1980), Dutrillaux (1986), Filippucci et al. (1988 a, b, 1990), and Tranier and Petter (1978).

Allozyme data given by Filippucci et al. (1988c) indicated that N African and Middle Eastern populations form a monophyletic group, and supported the recognition of melanurus as a distinct species of Eliomys . This hypothesis is tentatively followed here, but is based on few samples and needs corroboration. A critical morphological study of Eliomys throughout its range is needed.