Lepus victoriae Thomas, 1893

Robert S. Hoffmann, 1993, Order Lagomorpha, Mammal Species of the World (2 nd Edition), Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, pp. 807-827 : 822

Lepus victoriae Thomas, 1893 . Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., ser. 6, 12:268.

TYPE LOCALITY: "Nassa, Speke Gulf, S. Victoria Nyanza" [Lake, Tanzania].

DISTRIBUTION: From Atlantic coast of NW Africa ( Spanish Sahara, Mauritania, south to Guinea and Sierra Leone) eastward across Sahel to Sudan and extreme W Ethiopia; southward through E Africa (E Congo, W Kenya) to NE Namibia, Botswana, and Natal ( South Africa). Small isolated population in W Algeria.

STATUS: Isolated population around Beni Abbés, Algeria, "deservefs] attention" ( Flux and Angermann, 1990).

SYNONYMS: angolensis Thomas, 1904; ansorgei Thomas and Wroughton, 1905; canopus Thomas and Hinton, 1921; chadensis Thomas and Wroughton, 1907; cordeauxi DrakeBrockman, 1911; crawshayi de Winton, 1899 ; herero Thomas, 1926; kakumegae Heller, 1912; meridionalis Monard, 1933; micklemi Chubb, 1908; microtis Heuglin, 1865 ; raineyi Heller, 1912; whytei Thomas, 1894; zairensis Hatt, 1935; zechi Matschie, 1899; zuluensis Thomas and Schwann, 1905.

COMMENTS: Placed (as crawshayi ) in subgenus Proeulagus by Gureev (1964:204), who recognized both crawshayi and whytei as distinct species, as did Azzaroli-Puccetti (1987«). Formerly included in saxatilis ; see comments under that species. Angermann and Feiler (1988) demonstrated that the oldest available name for this species is victoriae . It is widely sympatric with capensis , but allo- to parapatric with saxatilis , which is also sympatric with capensis .