Scorpiops vonwicki Birula, 1913

Kovařík, František, 2020, Nine new species of Scorpiops Peters, 1861 (Scorpiones: Scorpiopidae) from China, India, Nepal, and Pakistan, Euscorpius 302, pp. 1-43 : 26-30

Scorpiops vonwicki Birula, 1913 stat. n.

( Figures 156–174 , 240 , Table 3)

Scorpiops petersi von-wicki Birula, 1913: 417–418 ; Vachon, 1980: 150.

Scorpiops petersii vonwicki: Fet, 2000: 494 .

Scorpiops petersii (in part): Kovařík, 2000: 192–194.

TYPE LOCALITY AND TYPE REPOSITORY. India, “ Assam, Aboren- Gebirge” [now Arunachal Pradesh State, Abor Hills, ca. 28.46°N 94.54°E; see Comments ] ; ZISP.

TYPE MATERIAL. India, “ Assam, Aboren-Gebirge (Dr. Williamson 1911 leg.). 1912, S. N. von-Wick ded.” [see Comments]; 1♀ (holotype) , ZISP No. 1054.

DIAGNOSIS (♀ holotype). Total length 52 mm. Base color uniformly reddish brown, telson and legs lighter. Pectinal teeth number 5–6 in female, fulcra present; marginal lamellae I (basal) and III present, marginal lamella II is not defined, connected with middle lamella in one compact unit. Patella of pedipalp with 17 (5 eb, 2 esb, 2 em, 4 est, and 4 et) external and 7 ventral trichobothria. Chela of pedipalp with 4 ventral trichobothria located on ventral surface. Chelal trichobothrium Eb 3 is located basally in proximal half of external surface at the same level as Dt. Fingers of pedipalps flexed in female. Chela length to width ratio 2.92 in female. Pedipalp movable finger with ca 10 IAD, ca 65 MD, 4 ID and 11–13 OD present. Tarsomere II of legs with 7–8 stout median ventral spines in a row and two other parallel spines. Telson rather elongate and smooth, length to depth ratio 3 in female; annular ring present.

COMMENTS. (Victor Fet, pers comm): This taxon was described based on a single holotype female; no other specimens are known. The holotype was brought to St. Petersburg by S. N. [Sergei Nikolaevich] von Wick [Russ. Сергей Николаевич фон Вик], a Russian zoologist of German extraction who explored India and Africa before World War I. Von Wick collected numerous zoological specimens for ZISP (then the Imperial Zoological Museum); a detailed travelogue of his expedition to Assam in January-March 1912 was published ( von Wick, 1913) .

However, according to Birula (1913: 417; information absent from the specimen label, see under Figs. 156–157 ), the holotype female of Scorpiops petersi von-wicki was collected not by von Wick in 1912 but by a “Dr. Williamson in 1911 in the mountains of the Abors” (in Birula’s German text, “Aboren-Gebirge”). Indeed, von Wick (1913: XV) specifically mentioned several animal specimens he received as a gift in Sadiya (where von Wick’s expedition stayed on 11-15 February 1912) from a British political official “who said that those were collected by Dr. Williamson in 1911 in the mountains of the Abors” (our translation from Russian).

Sadiya (27.83°N 95.67°E), a town on the Brahmaputra River (123 m a. s. l.) was the extreme northeastern frontier station of British Raj. It is most likely that the original collector was a former British Political Officer (not a “Doctor”), also stationed at Sadiya, Noel Williamson, infamously murdered by the locals in the Abor Hills in March 1911. Later same year, the British authorities sent the punitive Abor Expeditionary Force to enforce jurisdiction of this frontier.

Stanley W. Kemp (1882–1945), then of the Indian Museum (Calcutta) and his collector R. Hodgart accompanied the Abor Expeditionary Force and became the first zoologists who extensively collected in the Abor country in November 1911 – April 1912. An impressive volume, “The Zoological Results of Abor Expedition” was published by the Indian Museum in 1912–1922 in 18 parts. There, Henderson (1913) listed two more common species of scorpions (“ Scorpiops longimanus Poc. and Chaerilus tricostatus Poc. ”) collected by Kemp in the “Abor country”, now in Arunachal Pradesh, the most northeastern state of India.

One of the most interesting discoveries of the Abor Expedition was Typhloperipatus williamsoni Kemp, 1913 , a new genus and species of velvet worm (Onychopora), the only one known from India. Kemp (1914: 472) wrote: “The specific name is given in honour of the late Mr. Noel Williamson, one time Assistant Political Officer at Sadiya, who was treacherously murdered by Minyong Abors on March 30th, 1911, at Komsing, a village not many miles distant from the spot where the specimens were obtained. It was owing, chiefly, to the murder of Mr. Williamson and of his companion, Dr. Gregorson, that the expedition of 11–12 was undertaken.”

Several other new species in the same volume honored Williamson and Gregorson. The famous Himalayan explorer, Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Haversham Godwin-Austen (1834– 1923), named a new genus and species of land snail, Rotungia williamsoni , explaining: “I name this species in honour and in memory of Mr. Noel Williamson of the Indian Civil Service, who lost his life (30th March, 1911) penetrating into wilds of the Abor country, keen on their exploration and the desire of getting on friendly relations with the tribesmen. ... His murder led to the expedition up the Tsanspu, to the subjection of the Abors, and the accurate mapping by the officers of the Indian Survey of a vast area of unknown country in this part of the Eastern Himalaya, while the zoological collections have proved of extraordinary value and interest.” (Godwin-Austen, 1918: 591).

As we can see, von Wick collected at the same time but completely independently from the Abor Expedition (which he did not mention) and did not venture beyond Sadiya into the dangerous “mountains of the Abors”. Several specimens of “ Scorpiops longimanus ” collected by von Wick elsewhere in Assam (now Meghalaya State) are listed in the same paper by Birula (1913: 416).

It is now evident that the sole specimen, described as Scorpiops petersi von-wicki by a famous Russian scorpiologist Alexei A. Birula, was a gift passed on from Noel Williamson. His grave still exists in the village of Komsing on Siang River, with an original stone inscription and a more recent brass plaque “On this spot was murdered Noel Williamson, Assistant Political Officer Sadiya, 31st March 1911 ”.

DISTRIBUTION. India (Arunachal Pradesh State) ( Fig. 240 ).

Figures

Figure 240. Map of distribution of nine new species described here and Scorpiops vonwicki Birula, 1913.

Figures 156–160. Scorpiops vonwicki Birula, 1913 stat. n., female holotype. Dorsal (156) and ventral (157) views. Metasoma and telson lateral (158), dorsal (159), and ventral (160) views. Scale bars: 10 mm (156–157, 158–160).

Figures 161–169. Scorpiops vonwicki Birula, 1913 stat. n., female holotype, pedipalp segments. Chela dorsal (161), external (162) and ventral (163) views. Patella dorsal (164), external (165) and ventral (166) views. Femur and trochanter dorsal (167) view. Movable finger (168) and fixed finger (169) dentition. Trichobothrial pattern is indicated by white circles

Figures 170–174. Scorpiops vonwicki Birula, 1913 stat. n., female holotype, carapace and tergites I–III (170), posterior coxosternal area and sternites III–IV (171), right legs III–IV, retrolateral aspect (172–173 respectively), telson lateral (174).