Carabus arcadicus

Description

Carabus arcadicus is abeetle in the carabid family. The genus Carabus is represented in Europe with thirty-six subgenera. Carabus arcadicus belongs to the subgenus Chaetocarabus. This is represented in Central Europe by Carabus intricatus. The beetle is only found in Greece and possibly Albania. In its first description it is described as one of the most beautiful Carabids The striking beetle was described by Gistel in 1850 under the name that is still valid today, also in 1853 under the name Carabus adonis von Hampe. In 1955 Mandl described particularly small specimens as an alpine form (morph) under the name Carabus (Chaetocarabus) intricatus arcadicus m. parnassica. Carabus arcadicus merlini is listed in some databases as a subspecies of Carabus arcadicus, in others as a separate species Carabus merlini Schaum 1861. An open letter from Schaufuss shows that Schaufuss introduced the beetle as a new species in wanted to describe to a French trade journal. However, the magazine declined publication because of foam's classification of the beetle as a geographical race. Schaufuss refers to the short communications in which, in 1861, foam takes the view that, despite the obvious differences, this is the casemerlini only a geographic race. In a footnote, Schramm provides a diagnosis of merlini in Latin. In 1903 finds of transitional forms between arcadicus and merlini were made known. Figures 3 to 6 show two corresponding views of Carabus arcadicus arcadicus and Carabus arcadicus merlini. A picture with the Aedeagus of both subspecies can be found on the Internet. The species names arcadicus and parnassicus refer to the localities of the beetle (Arcadia and Parnassus). The species name adonis alludes to the beauty of the beetle. The name merlini was suggested by Krüper (Krueper). Krüper found the beetle in Greece and handed it over to Schaufuss for a description. The name Carabus appeared in Linnaeus before his introduction of the binomial nomenclature and was initially used by him for all ground beetles except the tiger beetles. The name of the subgenus Chaetocarabus (from Carabus and Altgr. χαίτη " chāīte " for "bristle") goes back to Thomson 1875. With the subgenus, Thomson delimits the Carabus species with non-thickened, swollen occiput, whose penultimate button segment has bristles, from those in which the penultimate segment is not bristled.