Melitaea

Genus of butterflies

"Melithea" redirects here. For the octocoral genus, see Melithaea.

For the town of ancient Thessaly, see Melitaea (Thessaly).

Melitaea

Adult male Melitaea arcesia chuana,
a member of Melitaea sensu stricto
Scientific classification
Kingdom:  | Animalia
Phylum:  | Arthropoda
Class:  | Insecta
Order:  | Lepidoptera
Family:  | Nymphalidae
Subfamily:  | Nymphalinae
Tribe:  | Melitaeini
Subtribe:  | Melitaeina
Newman, 1870
Genus:  | Melitaea
Fabricius, 1807
Type species
Papilio cinxia

Linnaeus, 1758

Diversity
Some 85 species (but see text)
Synonyms

Athaliaeformia Verity, 1950
Cinclidia Hübner, [1819]
Didymaeformia Verity, 1950
Lucina Rafinesque, 1815 (non Bruguière, [1797][verification needed]: preoccupied)
Melilaea (lapsus)
Melinaea Sodoffsky, 1837 (non Hübner, 1816: preoccupied)
Melitea (lapsus; non Peron & Lesueur, 1810: preoccupied)
Melithea (lapsus)
Melithoea (lapsus)
Melitoea (lapsus)
Mellicta Billberg, 1820
Schoenis Hübner, [1819]

Melitaea is a genus of brush-footed butterflies (family Nymphalidae). They are here placed in the tribe Melitaeini of subfamily Nymphalinae; some authors elevate this tribe to subfamily rank.

As delimited here, Melitaea includes the genus Mellicta, making the subtribe Melitaeina monotypic (but see below). For long, it was believed that Mellicta was a junior objective synonym of Melitaea, sharing the same type species (the Glanville fritillary, M. cinxia). This was in error, however; the type species of Mellicta is actually the heath fritillary (M. athalia), making the two taxa junior subjective synonyms and thus eligible to be separated again. However, several other taxa are in fact objective synonyms (or at least have type specimens belonging to the same biological species) of Melitaea and Mellicta – Schoenis and the preoccupied Lucina and Melinaea for the former, Athaliaeformia for the latter.[1]

## Taxonomy[edit]

Adult Melitaea didymoides pekinensis, belonging to the large didyma group

Adult Melitaea solona evadne (minerva group)

Adult male Melitaea punica (phoebe group)

As noted above, Mellicta is considered to be a subgenus of Melitaea for the time being. The rationale is that even though the Melitaeina may not be monotypic, they do not seem to consist of just two genera (Melitaea and Mellicta) either, and recognition of Mellicta appears to leave Melitaea paraphyletic; consequently, other lineages would need elevation to distinct genus status also. As long as it is not fully known which species groups and/or subgenera warrant recognition as full genera, they are all retained in the present genus.

### Species[edit]

In the following list, species-group/subgenus affiliation and type species are annotated. In the sensu lato circumscription used here, Melitaea contains almost ninety species. Most being assignable to one of the five groups/subgenera, there are a few that cannot be clearly placed with one of these at present:[2]

didyma/Didymaeformia group

* Melitaea abyssinica Oberthür, 1909
* Melitaea acraeina (Staudinger, 1886)
* Melitaea agar Oberthür, 1888
* Melitaea ala Staudinger, 1881
* Melitaea alraschid Higgins, 1941
* Melitaea ambrisia Higgins, 1935
* Melitaea arduinna (Esper, 1783) – Freyer's fritillary
* Melitaea athene Staudinger, 1881
* Melitaea avinovi Sheljuzhko, 1914
* Melitaea casta (Kollar, [1848])
* Melitaea chitralensis Moore, 1901
* Melitaea deserticola Oberthür, 1909 – desert fritillary
* Melitaea didyma (Esper, 1778) – spotted fritillary, red-band fritillary (type of Didymaeformis)
* Melitaea didymina Staudinger, 1895
* Melitaea didymoides Eversmann, 1847
* Melitaea enarea Fruhstorfer, 1917
* Melitaea fergana Staudinger, 1882
* Melitaea infernalis Grum-Grshimailo, 1891
* Melitaea interrupta Kolenati, 1846
* Melitaea jitka Weiss & Major, 2000
* Melitaea kotshubeji Sheljuzhko, 1929
* Melitaea latonigena Eversmann, 1847
* Melitaea lunulata Staudinger, 1901
* Melitaea lutko Evans, 1932
* Melitaea meherparvari Carbonell, 2007
* Melitaea mimetica Higgins, 1940
* Melitaea mixta Evans, 1912
* Melitaea ninae Sheljuzhko, 1935
* Melitaea persea Kollar, [1850]
* Melitaea pseudoala Sheljuzhko, 1928
* Melitaea robertsi Butler, 1880 – Baluchi fritillary
* Melitaea romanovi Grum-Grshimailo, 1891
* Melitaea sarvistana Wiltshire, 1941
* Melitaea saxatilis Christoff, 1876[verification needed]
* Melitaea shandura Evans, 1924
* Melitaea sutschana Staudinger, 1892
* Melitaea trivia Denis & Schiffermüller, 1775 – lesser spotted fritillary, desert fritillary
* Melitaea yuenty Oberthür, 1888

cinxia/Melitaea sensu stricto group

* Melitaea amoenula C. & R.Felder, [1867]
* Melitaea arcesia Bremer, 1861 – blackvein fritillary
* Melitaea balbita Moore, 1874
* Melitaea bellona Leech, [1892]
* Melitaea cinxia (Linnaeus, 1758) – Glanville fritillary (type of Melitaea)
* Melitaea diamina (Lang, 1789) – false-heath fritillary
* Melitaea jezabel Oberthür, 1888
* Melitaea protomedia Ménétriés, 1859
* Melitaea sindura Moore, 1865

minerva group

* Melitaea asteroidea Staudinger, 1881
* Melitaea balba Evans, 1912
* Melitaea elisabethae Avinoff, 1910
* Melitaea ludmilla Churkin, Kolesnichenko & Tuzov, 2000
* Melitaea minerva Staudinger, 1881
* Melitaea pallas Staudinger, 1886
* Melitaea solona Alphéraky, 1881
* Melitaea sultanensis Staudinger, 1886
* Melitaea turanica Erschoff, 1874

phoebe/Cinclidia group

* Melitaea aetherie (Hübner, 1826) – aetherie fritillary
* Melitaea collina Lederer, 1861
* Melitaea consulis Wiltshire, 1941
* Melitaea gina Higgins, 1941
* Melitaea kuchi Wyatt, 1961
* Melitaea phoebe Denis & Schiffermüller, 1775 – knapweed fritillary (type of Cinclidia)
* Melitaea pseudosibina Alberti, 1969
* Melitaea punica Oberthür, 1876
* Melitaea scotosia Butler, 1878
* Melitaea sibina Alphéraky, 1881
* Melitaea telona Christoph, 1893 (formerly in M. phoebe or M. punica)
* Melitaea turkmanica Higgins, 1940

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Mellicta group

Adult Melitaea centralasiae of the Mellicta group

* Melitaea alatauica Staudinger, 1881
* Melitaea ambigua Ménétriés in Schrenck, 1859
* Melitaea asteria (Freyer, 1828) – little fritillary
* Melitaea athalia (Rottemburg, 1775) – heath fritillary (type of Mellicta)
* Melitaea aurelia Nickerl, 1850 – Nickerl's fritillary
* Melitaea britomartis Assmann, 1847 – Assmann's fritillary
* Melitaea caucasogenita Verity, 1930
* Melitaea centralasiae (Wnukowsky, 1929) (sometimes in M. menetriesi)
* Melitaea deione Geyer, 1832 – Provençal fritillary

* Melitaea menetriesi Caradja, 1895
* Melitaea nevadensis Oberthür, 1904
* Melitaea parthenoides Keferstein, 1851 – European meadow fritillary, meadow fritillary
* Melitaea plotina Bremer, 1861
* Melitaea rebeli Wnukowsky, 1929
* Melitaea varia (Meyer-Dür, 1851) – Grisons fritillary
* Melitaea westsibirica (Dubatolov, 1998)

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Incertae sedis

* Melitaea kunlunensis Kudrna & Mracek, 1994
* Melitaea oorschoti Eckweiler, 2008
* Melitaea paludani Clench & Shoumatoff, 1956
* Melitaea tangigharuensis de Freina, 1980
* Melitaea wiltshirei Higgins, 1941

## Footnotes[edit]

1. ^ Pitkin & Jenkins (2004ab), FE (2009), and see references in Haaramo (2010, 2011)
2. ^ See references in Haaramo (2010, 2011)

## References[edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Melitaea.

Wikispecies has information related to Melitaea.

* Fauna Europaea (FE) (2009): Melitaea. Version 2.1, 22 December 2009. Retrieved 9 February 2011.
* Pitkin, Brian & Jenkins, Paul (2004a): Butterflies and Moths of the World, Generic Names and their Type-species – Melitaea. Version of 5 November 2004. Retrieved 9 February 2011.
* Pitkin, Brian & Jenkins, Paul (2004b): Butterflies and Moths of the World, Generic Names and their Type-species – Mellicta. Version of 5 November 2004. Retrieved 9 February 2011.
* Savela, Markku (2009): Markku Savela's Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms – Mellicta. Version of 17 August 2009. Retrieved 9 February 2011.
* Savela, Markku (2010): Markku Savela's Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms – Melitaea. Version of 2 May 2010. Retrieved 9 February 2011.

Taxon identifiers|

* Wikidata: Q1745802
* Wikispecies: Melitaea
* BioLib: 51605
* BOLD: 3657
* ButMoth: 17518.0
* CoL: 92F8N
* EoL: 18660
* EPPO: 1MLITG
* Fauna Europaea: 441577
* Fauna Europaea (new): 34d5f583-7780-44f5-b46a-502892bdf32b
* GBIF: 1899214
* iNaturalist: 57496
* ITIS: 1090144
* LepIndex: 155295
* NBN: NHMSYS0000516510
* NCBI: 104514

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