Melitaea ornata ornatiformis Sagarra, 1931

Melitaea phoebe View in CoL f. ornatiformis Sagarra, 1931

[TL: Spain, Castilla-La Mancha, Cuenca, Villacabras]; the only two known specimens of this subspecies, a male and a female, were considered to be “types” by SAGARRA (1931: 114), who stated that they were taken by Querci on 24 August 1928. These two specimens are housed in the Museo de Ciencias Naturales de Barcelona [now MZB], Spain and were designated as “Holotype” male and “Paratype” female by MACIÀ et al. (2017: 175) but no labels were attached to the specimens indicating this action. From high quality photographs ( Figs 15a, b) provided to the authors by Masó (see acknowledgements), both specimens were identified as M. ornata . A “holotype” label was added subsequently to the pin of the male and an “allotype” label to that of the female.

The data labels on the pins providing the location and date of capture ( Fig. 15c) are old preprinted labels (both specimens), with data reading: “? (obscured, if ever present). 8.1926” but this has been over-written, presumably by Querci himself, as “24 June 1928”. The authors SAGARRA (1931: 114), MANLEY & ALLCARD (1970:40) and MACIÀ, CABALLERO-LÓPEZ, & MASÓ (2017: 175) considered that the original printed month, “8”, (but not the printed year) indicated the date of capture. If the date on the printed label was correct, why would it have been over-written by Querci? The present authors consider that the date of capture was in fact the explicitly added, over-written date, “24 June 1928”. This fits better with the usual univoltinity of M. ornata , both sexes of which would be expected to be on the wing at an elevation of 1200 m in June ( RUSSELL & PATEMAN, 2011). The labels on the pin of the holotype ( Fig. 15c) are as follows: on white paper with black surround printed in black “73-4026/ MZB”; on beige paper printed in black “NUEVA CASTILLA (Cuenca)/ Villacabras 1200 m./ [?].8.1926, [over-written by hand] 24 June 1928 Querci”; on white paper with double black surround printed “ Melitaea phoebe / ornatiformis Sagarra ,/ 1930”/ black line/ “ Melitaea phoebe (Goeze,/ 1779)/ R. Macià rev. 2015”; on red paper with black surround printed “MZB/ HOLOTYPE/ Melitaea phoebe / ornatiformis / Sagarra, 1931 ”; on white paper with black surround printed “ Melitaea ornata / ornatiformis / Sagarra, 1931 / Determined Russell,/ 2019. We here formally identify the two specimens as Melitaea ornata ornatiformis Sagarra, 1931 , comb. n.

It is of interest to note that there is a pair of Melitaea specimens in the Rothschild collection in the NHM in London with the same printed data labels. One is a female with a locality “Reillo 1000 m”, similarly over-written, again presumably by the captor - Querci, with the same date, “24 June 1928”. The other is a male, likewise captured by Querci, and is labelled “Huelamo 1200 m”, with a date of “6. 8. 1928”: the day “6” is handwritten, the month “8” printed and unaltered and the year has the printed “1926” with the “6” overwritten by an “8”. It is probable that this specimen may be M. phoebe but it is acknowledged that it could represent a second brood M. ornata . This illustrates the difficulty in identifying museum material of these two species when dates of capture, which can be of significance, are unclear, being overwritten in faded ink on preprinted labels.