Mesalina bernoullii (Schenkel, 1901), 2017

Jiří Šmíd, Jiří Moravec, Václav Gvoždík, Jan Štundl, Daniel Frynta, Petros Lymberakis, Paschalia Kapli, Thomas Wilms, Andreas Schmitz, Mohammed Shobrak, Saeed Hosseinian Yousefkhani, Eskandar Rastegar-Pouyani, Aurora M. Castilla, Johannes Els & Werner Mayer, 2017, Cutting the Gordian Knot: Phylogenetic and ecological diversification of the Mesalina brevirostris species complex (Squamata, Lacertidae), Zoologica Scripta 46 (6), pp. 1-30 : 17-18

Mesalina bernoullii (Schenkel, 1901) comb. nov.

Eremias bernoullii – Schenkel (1901)

Eremias brevirostris – Boulenger (1887)

Eremias brevirostris forma typica – Angel (1936)

Eremias brevirostris fieldi – Haas & Werner (1969). Holotype MCZ 56617. Type locality Mahor Birinji , Khuzestan Province, Iran. MorphoBank pictures: M407313–M407317.

Mesalina brevirostris – Szczerbak (1989)

Mesalina brevirostris brevirostris – Szczerbak (1989)

Holotype. NMB 4396 . Type locality: ‘ Palmyra’ ( Syria). MorphoBank pictures: M407230– M407235.

Distribution. Sinai, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, south­western Iran, Kuwait, north­eastern Saudi Arabia ( Fig. 1 ).

Notes. Mesalina bernoullii represents a morphologically very variable species ( Table S5 ). Several geographically isolated morphotypes that differ considerably in body size and scalation can be found within its large range. For example, Haas and Werner (1969) assigned a subspecific status ( Eremias brevirostris fieldi ) to the population from south­western Iran characterized by low numbers of dorsal and gular scales and subdigital lamellae and Moravec (2004) described a morphotype from Jabal al Arab, southern Syria, that has unusually high numbers of scales of the same characters. Nevertheless, our results did not show any correlation between this morphological and phylogenetic clustering.

The material analyzed in this study included specimens from the type locality of Eremias bernoullii Schenkel, 1901 corresponding morphologically to the holotype of this taxon. It also included a specimen from ca. 40 km of the type locality of E. brevirostris fieldi Haas and Werner, 1969 corresponding morphologically to this form, as well as individuals representing the Jabal al Arab morphotype. Based on the results of the phylogenetic and morphological analyses we conclude that the name Eremias brevirostris fieldi Haas and Werner, 1969 is a junior subjective synonym of Eremias bernoullii Schenkel, 1901 .

Figures

Figure S 1. Results of the BI analysis of concatenated mtDNA data and GMYC species delimitation analysis. (a) MCC tree from the mtDNA analysis with posterior probabilities ≥ 0.95 shown by nodes. Sample codes correspond to those in Table S 1. Branches colored in red indicate putative species identified by the GMYC species delimitation analysis. (b) Likelihood values produced by GMYC to estimate the transition between cladogenesis and intraspecific coalescence. (c) Lineage­through­time plot based on the depicted tree that shows the transition from interspecific to intraspecific branching events (red line). The time scale in (b) and (c) is relative.