Buthus occitanus (Amoreux, 1789), restricted distribution

Sousa, Pedro, Arnedo, Miquel A. & Harris, D. James, 2017, Updated catalogue and taxonomic notes on the Old-World scorpion genus Buthus Leach, 1815 (Scorpiones, Buthidae), ZooKeys 686, pp. 15-84 : 34

41. Buthus occitanus (Amoreux, 1789), restricted distribution

= Scorpio rufus : Amoreux 1789a: 42-43 (synonymized by Amoreux 1789b, as the first revisor, ICZN article 24.2.2).

= Androctonus ajax : C. L. Koch 1839b: 53, pl. CXCIII, fig. 467 (synonymized by Simon 1879: 96). Type lost: Spain.

= Androctonus eurialus : C. L. Koch 1839b: 25-27, pl. CLXXXVII (not pl. CXXXVIl, as listed in the text), fig. 448 (synonymized by Simon 1879: 96). Type lost, France.

= Androctonus eurilochus : C. L. Koch 1839b: 27-28, pl. CLXXXVII, fig. 449 (synonymized by Kraepelin 1891: 196). Type lost, locality unknown.

= Buthus europaeus : Thorell 1876b: 7. Type is the lost Linnaeus (1748, 1754), specimen, purportedly from Italy (see the above "type species of Buthus " section and Fet et al. 2002).

tridentatus = Buthus europaeus tridentatus: Franganillo 1918: 122-123 (syn. n.). Type unknown, Janvier, Navarre, Spain.

Scorpio occitanus : Amoreux 1789a: 42-43, pl. I, fig. 2; Amoreux 1789b: 10-16, pl. I. fig. 3; Herbst 1800: 73-82: Latreille 1804: 122; Latreille 1806: 132; Maccary 1810: 5-48; Audouin 1826: 172-173, pl. VIII, fig. 1; Audouin 1827: 410-411, pl. VIII, fig. 1; Dufour 1856 (part): 570.

Androctonus ajax : C. L. Koch 1850: 90.

Androctonus euryalus (ISS): C. L. Koch 1850: 90.

Androctonus eurylochus (ISS): C. L. Koch 1850: 90; Kraepelin 1891: 196.

Androctonus (Prionurus) occitanus : Lankester 1885: 380.

Buthus europaeus : Karsch 1879 a: 18; Simon 1879: 96-98; Pavesi 1880: 312-313; Simon 1880 c: 29; Pavesi 1884: 450; Pavesi 1885: 197, 199; Simon 1885: 51; Pocock 1889a: 116; Thorell 1893: 358-359; Birula 1896: 241-243; Birula 1900 c: 9; Hirst 1925 (part): 415-416; Gadeau de Kerville 1926: 71; Bacelar 1928: 191; Hugues 1933: 487-488.

Buthus occitanicus (ISS): Dalla Torre 1905: 3; Táborský 1934: 40.

Buthus occitanus : Leach 1815: 391; Risso 1826: 156-157; Peters 1861 b: 513; Karsch 1881a: 89; Kraepelin 1891 (part): 196-199 (part), pl. I, fig. 5, plI., fig. 18; Kraepelin 1895: 80; Kraepelin 1899: 26; Kraepelin 1901 a (part): 266; Werner 1902 (part): 598; Birula 1910: 118-120; Masi 1912: 101; Borelli 1914b: 460; Lampe 1917: 191; Pavlovsky 1924: 77; Pavlovsky 1925: 140; Werner 1925: 209; Werner 1936: 173; Schenkel 1938: 4; Feytaud 1940: 38-39; Vachon 1940: 242-247, 254-258, fig. 1-9, 29, 33, 61-64; Käsmer 1941: 231; Denis 1948: 155-156; Vachon 1948c: 61, fig. 5; Vachon 1949a: 156-160, fig. 331-344, 348, 372-380; Vachon 1950b: fig. 591; Vachon 1951a: fig. 641, 657, 663, 679, 687, 696; Vachon 1951b: 621-623; Vachon 1952a: 264; Vachon 1952b: 274-279; Vachon 1961: 31-32; Bücherl 1964: 57; Pérez 1974: 22; Vachon 1974: 873; Goulliart 1979: 2; Levy and Amitai 1980 (part): 15-16; Kinzelbach 1982: 53; Prost 1982: 5; Mari et al. 1987; Sissom 1990: 92, fig. 3.17C, L; Kovařík 1992a (part): 183; Reichholf and Steinbach 1992: 33, fig. 4-5; Crucitti 1993: 51; Crucitti et al. 1994: 57-66; Vincent 1994: 6; Crucitti and Chinè 1995: 15-26; Braunwalder 1997 b: 3; Crucitti and Chinè 1997: 195-200; Cloudsley-Thompson and Lourenço 1998: 1-2; Kovařík 1998: 106; Kovařík 1999 (part): 39, 42, fig. 3; Fet and Lowe 2000 (part): 92-94; Lourenço 2003 (part): 884, 886-887, fig. 27-32; Lourenço and Vachon 2004: 83-85, fig. 1-15; Kovařík and Whitman 2005 (part): 106; Teruel and Pérez-Bote 2005: 276; Castilla and Pons 2007: 258; Dupré et al. 2008: (pages unnumbered); Sousa et al. 2010: 207; Colombo 2011: 1; Rossi 2012: 274-278; Pedroso et al. 2013: 300; Rossi, Tropea and Yağmur 2013: 3; Martin-Eauclaire et al. 2014: 56; Teruel and Melic 2015: 6-9; Lourenço 2016b: fig. 2.

Buthus occitanus occitanus: Birula 1910: 118; Hadži 1929: 31; Vachon 1949a: 156-160, fig. 331-344; Vachon 1949c: 336; Vachon 1952a (part): 264; Le Corroller 1967: 63; Fet and Lowe 2000 (part): 94-95; Gantenbein and Largiadèr 2003 (part): 120, 122.

Buthus occitanus tridentatus: Fet and Lowe 2000: 97; Kovařík 2001: 79;

Buthus (Buthus) occitanus : Birula 1909 b: 507; Birula 1910: 143; Birula 1914 b: 644-664; Birula 1917a: 22, 38-39, 199, 213.

Buthus (Buthus) occitanus occitanus: Roewer 1943: 206.

Buthus cf. occitanus : Piñero et al. 2013: 88.

Scorpio australis (MIS): Asso 1784: 146, Tab. I, fig. 2.

Scorpio (Androctonus) occitanus : Gervais 1844a: 42-44; pl. XXIII, fig. 4.

Scorpio occitanicus (ISS): Serres 1822: 65.

Scorpion Occitanus (ISS): Latreille 1817: 105-106.

Type material.

type unknown, Souvignargues, Occitanie Region, France.

Distribution.

Traditionally, the distribution of B. occitanus was considered to span from the Moroccan Atlantic shores in North Africa to the Middle East in Asia and to Southern-Western Europe. However, following the description of new species in the genus, the present distribution of B. occitanus has been restricted to NE Spain and SW France. Several molecular phylogenetic studies have demonstrated that the species range does not extend beyond Western Europe ( Gantenbein and Largiadèr 2003, Sousa et al. 2010, 2012, Pedroso et al. 2013). Lourenço and Vachon (2004) and Rossi (2012) include redescriptions of B. occitanus that include only European animals, but Vachon (1952a) also included material from Morocco, which was most likely not conspecific.

Remarks.

All material collected outside of the range here proposed should be considered as Buthus sp . Only the re-examination of those specimens could reveal their appropriate identity. Vachon (1952a) included animals from the west (Atlantic) coast of Morocco, from Kenitra to El Jadida, within his definition of B. o. occitanus. As explained above this material is now considered not to be part of B. occitanus and thus remains unnamed. We opted to leave Androctonus eurilochus in synonymy with B. occitanus , despite the uncertain about the species provenance, to help to stabilise the genus’ taxonomy. To further bring stability to Buthus taxonomy we propose Franganillo’s subspecies, B. o. tridentatus, as a junior synonym of B. occitanus . Although the type specimen is not known (if it ever existed as such), its type locality is clearly stated as Javier, in Navarre, Spain. Extensive sampling on the left bank of the Ebro River ( Sousa 2017) indicates that only B. occitanus occurs in this part of Spain and hence we here propose this new synonymy.