Cophias bilineatus Wied, 1821 Plate

Vanzolini, Paulo E. & Myers, Charles W., 2015, The Herpetological Collection Of Maximilian, Prince Of Wied (1782 - 1867), With Special Reference To Brazilian Materials, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2015 (395), pp. 1-155 : 65

Cophias bilineatus Wied, 1821 Plate 47 and figure 24 (holotype)

1820 Reise 1: 248.

1821 Reise 2: 339.

1824 Abbildungen: Lief. 5.

1824 Isis : 670 (listed with reference to the Abbildungen).

1825 Beitra¨ge: 483, 605, pl. 3 ( figs. 3–4 ).

PRESENT STATUS: Bothrops bilineatus (Wied, 1821) , aka Bothriopsis bilineata .

REMARKS: In the first volume of the Reise Wied mentions incidentally a green viper. In the ‘‘corrections and additions’’ at the end of the second volume, explicitly referring to that page and that viper, Wied presents a formal description. In the Abbildungen a good plate is given of the whole animal. In the Beitra¨ge measurements and scale counts are presented of the Wied specimen and of an additional specimen in a Dutch collection.

The type measured 554 + 79 mm, had 208 ventrals and 66 subcaudals. AMNH R-4006, a male, measures 505 + 80 mm, and has 208 ventrals; the caudals cannot now be counted. We conclude that AMNH R-4006 is the holotype .

The mention of the snake in the Reise was made when Wied was staying at Villa Vic¸oza, successively known as Maroba´ and nowadays Nova Vic¸osa (17 ° 539S, 39 ° 229W).

Figures

Fig. 24. Holotype of Cophias bilineatus Wied (AMNH R-4006).

Fig. 3. Title page from the third volume of Prince Maximilian’s Abbildungen zur Naturgeschichte Brasiliens (Wied, 1822–1831). Illustrated taxa are listed on the volume (Liefererung) title pages, but the contained plates are unnumbered (there are 6 plates in each of 12 Liefererungen). The herpetological plates reproduced herein are arbitrarily numbered 1–56 following the organization of the present work, which reflects the order of species presentation in volume 1 of the Beitra¨ge (fig. 4). Geographic modifiers (Neuwied and Runkel) were dropped from the Wied family name in 1824. After that, ‘‘Wied-Neuwied’’ appeared only on the title pages of the Abbildungen, which had begun publication two years earlier.

Fig. 4. Title page of volume 1 of Prince Maximilian’s Beitra¨ge zur Naturgeschichte von Brasilien (Wied, 1825). This first of four volumes is the only one devoted to herpetology. Many new species are described in this fundamental work, which assembles information for all reptiles and amphibians collected by Wied.