Parides vercingetorix

Parides vercingetorix is a species of butterfly in the family Papilionidae. It is endemic to French Guiana. Formerly, this species was known as Parides coelus and originally described as Papilio coelus by Jean Baptiste Boisduval in 1836, but that name was already used in 1781 by Stoll for the butterfly now known as Aguna coelus. Consequently, the Parides species had to receive a new name.

Parides vercingetorix
Conservation status
Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[1]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Family:	Papilionidae
Genus:	Parides
Species:	P. vercingetorix
Binomial name
Parides vercingetorix (Oberthür, 1888)
Synonyms
Papilio coelus Boisduval, 1836[2] (non Stoll, 1781: preoccupied) Papilio vercingetorix Oberthür, 1888 Parides coelus (Boisduval, 1836, non Stoll, 1781: preoccupied)

Description

Forewing with a white spot, obsolete at the margins, which fills up the extremity of the cell, and extends on to the disc. Hindwing with red band on the disc, in the male composed of four spots, in the female of six. A full description is provided by Rothschild, W. and Jordan, K. (1906)^[3]

Description from Seitz

For a key to the terms used, see Glossary of entomology terms.

P. coelus Boisd. (male = vercingetorix Oberth.) (Id). Forewing with a white spot, obsolete at the margins, which fills up the extremity of the cell, and extends on to the disc. Hindwing with red band on the disc, in the male composed of four spots, in the female of six. — French Guiana, the male in Oberthur's Collection, one female in the Paris Museum.^[4]

Taxonomy

Parides vercingetorix is a member of the chabrias species group^[5]

The members are

• Parides chabrias
• Parides coelus
• Parides hahneli
• Parides mithras
• Parides pizarro
• Parides quadratus

Status

A rare little known species.