Centrisautrani Vachal,1904

Vivallo, Felipe, 2023, The primary types of some species of Centris bees described by European entomologists in the 18 and 20 centuries (Hymenoptera: Apidae), European Journal of Taxonomy 864, pp. 1-27 : 21-22

Centrisautrani Vachal,1904

Centrisautrani Vachal, 1904: 16 (junior synonym of C. flavohirta Friese, 1899 ).

Type data

Vachal described this species based on two females and one male from Argentina and one female from Arica, Chile. Apparently, this type series was composed by at least two species, because C. autrani (= C. flavohirta ) does not occur in Chile ( Vivallo 2020b). Unfortunately, the female from Chile was not found during the preparation of this paper. The rest of the type series, including the lectotype male designated by Zanella (2002) is housed at MNHN. The specimen bears the following data label: [yellowish label] ARGENTINE PROV. TUCUMAN LARA 4000M G. A. BAER, 2-1903 [printed]\ [yellowish label] MUSEUM PARIS [printed] Tucuman A. Baer 1903 [handwritten]\ [yellowish label] Centris autrani 1903 n . sp J. Vachal [handwritten]\ [red label] TYPE [printed]\ [white label] LECTOTYPE Centris autrani Vachal F. Zanella, 2002 [printed] (MNHN).

Despite Vachal mentioning only four specimens in the original description, another six males with the same original label of Baer were found at MNHN. Those specimens were labeled as paralectotypes by Zanella (2002).

Type locality

Argentina: Tucumán Province, Lara.

John Obadiah Westwood

John Obadiah Westwood (1805‒1893) was an English entomologist, archaeologist and the first appointed curator of the Hope Entomological Collections at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History ( Anonymous 1893). Westwood was one of the first entomologists with an academic position at the University of Oxford. He donated to that institution his insect collection which was later incorporated to the Hope Collection ( Wandolleck 1894). Westwood died in Oxford, aged 87.

Westwood’s Centris bee

Westwood described a single species in Centris , based on an undetermined number of specimens that belonged to the collection of the British entomologist and naturalist Frederick William Hope (1797‒1862). In 1849, Hope gave his entire collection of insects to the University of Oxford ( Baker 1994), which included the specimens studied by Westwood. Currently, it is formally known as the Hope Entomological Collections and it is held by the Oxford University Museum of Natural History (OUMNH).