248 THE GENUS TAPINOCYBA. 



The Genus Tapinocyba. By A. Randell Jackson, 

 M.B., M.Sc. 



Read March 14TH, 1905. 



(Plates VII. and VIII.) 



Last summer, when in conversation with Rev. O. P. 

 Cambridge, F.R.S., I expressed a wish that the Tapinocybae 

 were well worked out. He suggested that I should do this 

 necessary piece of work, and has very kindly lent me his un- 

 rivalled collection of the species of that genus. Without this 

 material the work could never have been accomphshed. 

 Messrs. Falconer, F. P. Smith, Evans, Warburton, Dr. 

 Carpenter, and the late F. O. P. Cambridge have all assisted 

 me with material and information. MM. Simon and de Lessert 

 have kindly lent and given me most useful examples from 

 France and Switzerland. I believe I have seen and examined 

 very nearly all the known British examples of this interesting 

 genus. 



The genus Tapinocyba was created in 1884 by M. Simon 

 for the reception of several species of minute spiders. It is 

 without doubt very nearly related to the genus Diplocephahis, 

 it being extremely difficult to draw a hard and fast line 

 between the two. In Tapinocyba, however, the eyes are 

 usually larger and closer together. The second row is not 

 so strongly procurved. The legs are shorter. The tarsi are 

 longer in relation to the metatarsi, and there is no cephalic 

 eminence, or lobe, in the male sex. 



The species T. insechis (L. Koch), however, comes very 

 near to Diplocephalus, only differing essentially from D. Beckii 

 (Camb.) by its slightly shorter legs, longer tarsi, and the 

 absence of the cephalic elevation. It is significant of this 

 close relationship that M. Simon considers the first a Diplo- 

 cephalus, and Professor Kulczynski the second a Tapinocyba. 



Nevertheless the five British species are all very distinct 

 specifically, both from each other and from allied forms. 



