Under Construction

Containing group: Charaxini

Introduction

Big, beautiful Charaxes butterflies - the most diverse genus in Africa? Or maybe the most oversplit. Ackery et al. (1995) state, "No group of African butterflies arouses stronger emotions than Charaxes." Gaining an understanding of their phylogenetic relationships will add a new chapter to their convoluted literature.

Most of the species above are Afrotropical taxa (Charaxes jasius extends to southern Europe). The clade C. marki - C. fervens are the ones distributed from Indomalaya, the Indonesian archipelago to New Guinea (in addition to C. solon).

Females are often larger than males, and many of them exhibit paler coloration or white bands on the wings that are not present in the males.  The larvae possess large sclerotized "horns" on their head capsules.

Discussion of Phylogenetic Relationships

The tree displayed is based on information from several sources and does not represent a result of a single phylogenetic analysis.  The backbone of the tree and the hypothesis that Polyura and Euxanthe are nested within a paraphyletic Charaxes is based on the molecular analysis of Aduse-Poku et al. (2009).  Phylogenetic relationships of the Indo-Australasian clade have been examined by Müller et al. (2010), also based on DNA sequences, and that clade is inserted at its putative position based on partially-overlapping samples in these two studies.  Several of the more widespread species appear to be paraphyletic, including C. bernardus, C. latona and C. affinis.

Members of Larsen's (2005) putative species groups for west African taxa not sampled in the above studies are tentatively placed with their relatives. A long list of extralimital members of these groups is included on the parent of this page, and awaits a phylogenetic analysis.

Other Names for Charaxes Ochsenheimer 1816

• Paphia Fabricius 1807 invalid - junior homonym of Paphia [Röding] 1798 (Mollusca: Veneridae)
• Eriboea Hübner 1819 currently viewed as a subjective junior synonym
• Jasia Swainson 1832 invalid - junior objective synonym of Charaxes; name # 1306 on Official Index of Rejected and Invalid Generic Names in Zoology
• Haridra Moore 1880 currently viewed as a subjective junior synonym
• Zinhga Hemming 1939 currently viewed as a subjective junior synonym
• Hadrodontes Stoneham 1964 published without type designation - unavailable
• Stonehamia Cowan 1968 replacement name for Hadrodontes; currently viewed as a subgenus

References

Ackery PR, Smith CR, and Vane-Wright RI eds. 1995. Carcasson's African butterflies. Canberra: CSIRO.

Aduse-Poku, K., Vingerhoedt, E.,Wahlberg, N. 2009. Out-of-Africa again: A phylogenetic hypothesis of the genus Charaxes (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae) based on 5 gene regions. Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 53, 463-478.

Corbet AS, Pendlebury HM, and Eliot JN. 1992. The butterflies of the Malay Peninsula. Malayan Nature Society, Kuala Lumpur.

Cowan CF. 1968. Annotationes Rhopalocerologicae. Clunbury Press, Berkhamsted, Herts.

Larsen, T.B. 1991. The butterflies of Kenya and their natural history. Oxford University Press, Oxford, U. K.

Larsen, T. B. 2005 Butterflies of West Africa. Stenstrup, Denmark: Apollo Books.

Müller, C.J., Wahlberg, N.,Beheregaray, L.B. 2010. 'After Africa': the evolutionary history and systematics of the genus Charaxes Ochsenheimer (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidaae) in the Indo-Pacific region. Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 100: 457-481.

Parsons M. 1999. The butterflies of Papua New Guinea: their systematics and biology. Academic Press, San Diego.

Vane-Wright RI, and de Jong R. 2003. The butterflies of Sulawesi: annotated checklist for a critical island fauna. Zoologische Verhandelingen 343: 1-267.

Information on the Internet

• Lepidoptera and some other life forms: Charaxes