EOBUTHUS. 13 



Genus EOBUTHUS, Fritsch. 

 1904. Eobuthus, A. Fritsch, Palaeoz. Aracliu., p. 72 (in part). 



This genus was based by Fritsch on two Carboniferous Scorpions from Bohemia, 

 one in the museum at Prague, the other in the British Museum. Both were named 

 E. ralcovnicensis. The specimen at Prague I have not seen ; but if Fritsch' s 

 restoration of it approaches accuracy, the fossil cannot be assigned to the same 

 genus as that in the British Museum. One great difference between them lies in 

 the structure of the chela?, the movable digit in the Prague specimen being much 

 shorter than the length of the hand or manias, and only a little exceeding its 

 breadth,whereas in the British Museum specimen the length of the movable digit 

 greatly exceeds both the length and breadth of the hand. Moreover, the structure 

 of the sternal surface of the pi-osoma in the Prague specimen is quite abnormal in 

 the circumstance, that the coxae of the legs of the last pair appear to abut against 

 the genital operculum, those of the third pair alone running up to the sternal plate 

 of the prosoma. In the British Museum specimen, on the contrary, so far as I can 

 judge, the coxa? of these appendages are quite normal in their mode of attachment 

 to the body. This specimen, in fact, appears to be a normal Scorpion in every 

 respect, except that the sternal plates of the fifth and sixth segments of the opistho- 

 soma are seemingly slightly lobate posteriorly with a shallow median notch. 



Since the diagnosis of Eobuthus was taken, mainly, at all events, from the 

 specimen at Prague, I propose to regard that specimen as the type of E. ralcovni- 

 censis. Different names, both generic and specific, must therefore be found for the 

 example in the British Museum. 



According to Fritsch the generic name Anthracoscorpio was given by Kusta to 

 a Scorpion named A. juvenis, which is the young of Eobuthus ralcovnicensis. If this 

 be so Fritsch had no right, according to the accepted rules of nomenclature, to 

 assign new generic and specific names to the fossils in question. But the figure 

 he published of the type of Anthracoscorpio juoenis cannot, according to his inter- 

 pretations, represent the young of the typical Eobuthus ralcovnicensis as here 

 understood. It may, however, represent the young of the form in the British 

 Museum. At all events the two specimens are likely enough to be congeneric. 

 I propose, therefore, to assign the specimen in the British Museum to the genus 

 Anthracoscorpio ; and since I cannot, on the available evidence, separate this 

 specimen specifically from the type of Eoscorpius spartliensis (cf. infra, p. 20), it 

 may take for the time being the name Anthracoscorpio sparthensis. 



I have seen only one British Scorpion which appears to agree with the type of 

 Eobuthus ralcovnicensis in the mode of attachment of the posterior limbs to the body. 

 This I propose to name as follows : 



