Holopyga generosa ( Förster, 1853 )

Rosa, Paolo, Felsner, Christian, Heim, René, Greeff, Michael, Michez, Denis & Bernasconi, Marco Valerio, 2025, The Palaearctic types of Chrysididae (Insecta, Hymenoptera) deposited in the Linsenmaier collection. Part 5. Elampini: genus Holopyga Dahlbom, 1845, Zootaxa 5565 (1), pp. 1-66 : 52

Holopyga generosa ( Förster, 1853)

Ellampus generosus Förster, 1853: 349 . Holotype ♂; Germany: Aachen (type depository: Berlin) (examined).

Holopyga generosa ( Förster, 1853) = Holopyga chrysonota ( Förster, 1853) : Kimsey & Bohart 1991: 230.

Holopyga generosa : Kunz 1994: 86.

Holopyga fastuosa generosa : Linsenmaier 1997: 250.

Holopyga generosa : Niehuis 2001: 121. Reinstated.

Remarks. In the last years, the name of this species has been changed at least four times. For a long time, in European literature, this species was confused with Holopyga amoenula Dahlbom, 1845 and Holopyga gloriosa ( Fabricius, 1793) . Linsenmaier (1959a) identified and keyed this species for the first time with the name Holopyga ovata Dahlbom, 1854 . Later, Linsenmaier (1987) noticed that the name Holopyga generosa ( Förster, 1853) had priority, and finally ( Linsenmaier 1997) considered it as the European subspecies of norther African Holopyga fastuosa ( Lucas, 1849) , another name with priority. Kimsey & Bohart (1991) placed Holopyga fastuosa and Holopyga ovata in synonymy with Holopyga amoenula , while they placed Holopyga generosa in synonymy of Holopyga chrysonota , which is clearly in error ( Rosa 2006). Presently, the name mostly used in European literature is Holopyga generosa ( Niehuis 2001; Rosa 2006; Rosa & Soon 2012; Paukkunen et al. 2014, 2015).

After examination of all related types, Paolo Rosa found that Holopyga nitidula Dahlbom, 1845 , described from France is the first available name for Holopyga generosa sensu auctorum and should be used as the valid name for this species because it has priority over all the other names. Moreover, no other specific name can be considered as the accepted name because of all the changes occurred in the last years. It should be noted that the situation in this group is also complicated by the presence of sibling species as suggested by multiple BINs (Barcode Index Number) associated to this taxon ( Schmid-Egger et al. 2024). Therefore, to avoid confusion between several names used in literature, we suggest naming this taxon Holopyga nitidula , the name with priority, that would consent to restart almost from scratches the taxonomy of this complicated subgroup of species.