Leptopilos memorialis (Spassky, 1940) Chatzaki & Keer, 2019

Chatzaki, Maria & Keer, Johan Van, 2019, Ground spiders (Araneae: Gnaphosidae, Liocranidae, Prodidomidae) from the Greek islands Rodos, Symi and Karpathos, with the description of new species, Zootaxa 4646 (3), pp. 434-460 : 444

Leptopilos memorialis (Spassky, 1940) comb.nov.

Leptodrassex memorialis (Spassky, 1940) : Kovblyuk and Nadolny 2010: 192, figs 20-39.

Material examined. Site 11: 1♂.

Comments. In his atlas of the Gnaphosidae of the world, Murphy (2007) introduced the new genus Leptodrassex in order to separate those Leptodrassus species which did not possess the distinctive character of the latter genus, namely the two large angular retromarginal teeth on their chelicerae (or cheliceral angular lamina, sensu Azevedo et al. (2018)) and instead they had small, conventional teeth on both cheliceral margins. As a result, the genus Leptodrassus remained to include the type-species L. femineus (Simon, 1873) , L. albidus Simon, 1914 , and possibly L. punicus Dalmas, 1919 (after Murphy 2007), while the rest of eight species still belonging to this genus have not yet been revised after their initial revision and therefore their placement is questioned. Two years later, Levy (2009) further divided the genus Leptodrassex on the basis of distinctive differences in the genital organs among its members, thus creating the new genus Leptopilos for those species with a cap-like anterior hood on the female epigyne and “ closely grouped laminae on the male palp ”, possibly referring to the multiple tegular apophyses and projections on the male bulb. Thus the species L. tenerrimus (O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1872) (as type species), L. pupa (Dalmas, 1919) , L. hadjissaranti (Chatzaki, 2002) and L. manolisi (Chatzaki, 2002) were transferred to Leptopilos , in addition to the two newly described L. levantinus Levy, 2009 and L. lakhish Levy, 2009 . Interestingly, none of these authors mentioned Leprodrassus memorialis (Spassky, 1940) which was only transferred to Leptodrassex by Kovblyuk and Nadolny in 2010. It seems that Kovblyuk and Nadolny were not aware of the very recent (at that time) publication by Levy (2009) and had therefore ignored the existence of the Leptopilos genus, to which L. memorialis apparently belongs, due to the obvious anterior cup on the epigynal anterior margin, very well described and illustrated by the two authors. In this case, the tegular apophyses of the male palps (loosely accepted as a distinctive character even by Levy (2009)) would not justify the transfer from one genus to the other, as they comprise synapomorphic characters within the Leptodrassinae subfamily, recently introduced by Azevedo et al. (2018).

Distribution. Greece, Ukraine, Russia (Europe to Central Asia), Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Mongolia.