A. G. Butler — Oldest known Foml Butterfiy. 3 



Stonesfield Slate (Oxfordshire). Coll. Edward Cbarlesworth. 

 Esq., F.G.S. 



Though a British Fossil insect, this species belongs to a group 

 completely tropical ; its nearest allies are the genera Caligo, Dasi/- 

 opMhalma, and Brassolis, all three essentially tropical American 

 genera. 



P. ooUtica is especially interesting, as being the oldest fossil 

 hutterfly yet discovered ; the most ancient previously known to 

 science having been foimd in the Cretaceous series (white sandstone 

 of Aix-la-Chapelle), whilst the bulk of the known species are from 

 the Lower Miocene beds of Croatia : it is also interesting as belong- 

 ing to the highest family of butterflies, and to> a sub-family inter- 

 mediate in character between two others, namely the Satyrince and 

 Nymphalincg, whilst the more recently discovered fossils are refer- 

 able, with one exception, to the two latter groups. The nervures 

 appear to have been impregnated with iron, which will partly 

 account for their well-defined condition. I have thought it well to 

 add to my plate representations of two fossils from the Cretaceous 

 and Miocene series, not only to show the remarkable state of preser- 

 vation, as regards pattern and colour, which they exhibit wdien 

 compared with the Jurassic, but in order that I may render more 

 definite certain remarks respecting them in my Catalogues of 

 Fabrician and Satyridian Lepidoptera. 



Genus Neorinopis, Butler {^Satyrinoe) . Neorinopis sepulta, Plate I., 

 Fig. 3. 



Ct/llo sepulta, Boisduval, Ann. Ent. Soc. France, p. 371, pi. 8 (1840). Vanessa 

 sepulta, Lefebvre, Ann. Ent. Soc. France, p. 71, pi. 3, figs, a — c (1851). 



Upper Cretaceous White Sandstone of Aix-la-Chapelle. 



I have discussed the position of this species in my Catalogue of 

 Satyridae (pp. 189, 190) ; showing that its nearest ally is Neorina 

 Lowii, a common Bornean species, but that it also has a slightly 

 more distant relationship to Antirrhcea Philoctetes and AncMpJilebia 

 archcea, two common tropical American forms ; the amount of 

 affinity,, as regards the two first of these species, may be seen on 

 referring to Plate I., Figs. 4 and 5 ; the resemblance to AncMphlehia 

 is less striking, and the affinity more doubtful. It has nothing to do 

 with Cyllo. 



G-enus Junonia, Hubner (Nymphalince) . Junonia ? Pluto, Plate L, 

 Fig. 7. 



Vanessa Pluto,^ Heer, Nouv. Mem. Soc. Helv. xi., p. 181, pi. 14 (1850). 



Lower Miocene Marlstone of Eadaboj, Croatia. 



I have noticed this species at p. 109 of my Catalogue of Fabrician 

 Diurnal Lepidoptera, Mr. W. H. Edwards of W. Virginia having 

 decided in his Butterflies of N America that it is unquestionably an 

 Argynnis allied to A. Diana, notwithstanding the important dis- 

 crepancies which Heer points out. That it may bear some distant 

 relationship to A. Diana is quite possible, but that it is " plainly an 

 Argynnis " is quite another thing ; to my mind it is plainly a 

 Vanessid, probably a Junonia near to J. Hedonia (see Fig. 6) ; and I 



1 This species is also figured in Lyell's Elements of Geology, p. 243, sixth ed., 1865. 



