On EUROPEAN SPIDERS. | 221 
ence in the fossiliferous deposits, and it is only in Amber that we meet with 
them numerously represented. The oldest known spiders belong to the 
Coal formation, in the strata of which a few specimens have been found 
in Bohemia?) and Silesia *), and probably also in England ?. Only one 
species belonging to that period is in sufficiently good preservation to be 
tolerably well characterized, viz. the Protolycosa anthracophila described by 
RÔMER, which was discovered in a piece of argillaceous slate at Kattowitz 
in Upper Silesia. It forms the type of the genus 
Protolycosa Rom. 1866 *. This spider, which is about 5 lines long, 
is by Romer placed in the vicinity of Lycosa; but this appears to me not 
to be right. The eyes and spinners, if indeed these organs ever existed, 
have unfortunately perished; nor is it possible to form any clear idea of the 
appearance of the mandibles, and it is therefore impossible to determine 
with absolute certainty the systematic position of the animal; nevertheless 
its general appearance and especially its extremely coarse and strong legs 
and palpi seem to me unequivocally to mark this genus as belonging to 
the Territelarie, and among these it is that wonderful East Indian genus 
Liphistius SCHIÖDTE, that Protolycosa most nearly resembles. Not only do 
these two genera agree in the unusual relative length of the legs — in 
Liphistius the proportion of the different pairs is 4, 2, 3, 1, in Protolycosa 
4, eee 1, and thus in both the 1* pair is the shortest of all; — but in 
Protolycosa also the dorsal integument of the abdomen is of a horny sub- 
stance, and, according to RÖMER’S figures, divided into transversal segments, 
each furnished with a cross-row of tubercles, just as is the case with Zi- 
phistius SCHIODTE 5). I conceive then that Protolycosa ought to be assigned 
1) "Palaranea borassifolia FRI” (!!), Vid. FEISTMANTEL, K., Die Steinkohlen- 
becken in der Umgebung von Radnie, p. 66, in Archiv f. d. naturwissensch. Landes- 
durchforschung von Böhmen, Bd I (Prag 1869); Conf. also *REuss, A. E., Kurze 
Uebersicht der Geognostischen Verhältnisse Bóhmens, p. 59 (Prag 1854), and Rö- 
MER, F., Protolycosa anthracophila, eine fossile Spinne aus dem Steinkohlengebirge 
Oberschlesiens, in LEONHARD and Bronn (GEINITZ), Neues Jahrbuch für Mineralogie, 
Geologie und Palæontologie, Jahrg. 1866, Hft 2, p. 143. (Stuttgard 1866). 
2) Romer, loc. cit., p. 136—143, Taf. III, fig. 1—3. 
3) Conf. *Luwyp (Lurpius), E., Lithophylacii Britanniei Ichnographia ete., Tab. 
IV (London 1690); "PARKINSON, J., The Organic Remains of a former world ete., III, 
Pl. 17, fig. 3—6 (London 1811); as ‘also a citation from Lawyp’s Epist. III, in 
Bucktann’s Geolog. and Miner., I, p. 406 (of Ed. 2). 
4) Deriv.: æowvoc, first, and Lycosa. 
5) Conf. Scæiôpre, Om en afvigende Slegt af Spindlernes Orden, p. 6—7. 
