Lithopsyche

Lithopsyche is a genus of fossil butterflies known from Oligocene-aged strata of the Isle of Wight, England. The sole specimen is too incomplete to allow a certain assignment of a family, but it was placed on its description as a geometrid and more recently in the Riodininae.

Lithopsyche Temporal range: Oligocene PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Illustration by Frederick William Frohawk
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Superfamily:	Papilionoidea
Family:	incertae sedis
Genus:	†Lithopsyche Butler, 1889
Species:	†L. antiqua
Binomial name
†Lithopsyche antiqua Butler, 1889

The late Eocene-aged Lithodryas styx, of Colorado, was originally described with the same genus name.

References

• Butler, A. G. (1889). "Description of a new Genus of Fossil Moths of the Family Euschemidæ". Proceedings of the General Meetings for Scientific Business of the Zoological Society of London.
• Cockerell, T. D. A. (1915). "British Fossil Insects" (PDF). Proceedings of the U.S. National Museum. 49 (21): 469–499. doi:10.5479/si.00963801.49-2119.469. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 June 2012.
• Hall, J. P. W.; Robbins, R. K.; Harvey, D. J. (2004). "Extinction and biogeography in the Caribbean: New evidence from a fossil riodinid butterfly in Dominican amber". Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 271 (1541): 797–801. doi:10.1098/rspb.2004.2691. PMC 1691661. PMID 15255097.