ARMANDIA. By Dr. K. Jordan. 
PARNASSIUS. By H. Fruhstorfer. 
109 
the 8 rd radial and at the apex yellowish grey. Under surface: basal area green, rest of the forewing grey 
with black bands, hindwing almost as above, sometimes entirely without yellow. — imperialis Hope (= hima- imperialis. 
laicus Bothsch., $ = parryae Hope ) (49 c). : the yellow area of the hindwing, although very variable in 
size, always enters the apex of the cell and beneath reaches the 1 st median. §: the central area of the hindwing 
above is grey with a little black to the 2 nd median and from there onwards yellow, beneath this area is some¬ 
times mostly black and without yellow. Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, Assam, Upper Burma. From April to August. 
The $$ from Sikkim and Bhutan appear to have a paler under surface to the hindwing ( himalaicus ) than $$ 
from Assam, yet examples also occur in Assam which are as pale as Sikkim specimens or even paler. — im- imperairix. 
peratrix Nicev. : less densely scaled with green than the preceding form, the yellow area of the hindwing 
does not enter the cell and beneath reaches to the 2 nd median; marginal teeth longer. $: the grey area of the 
hindwing above anteriorly densely dusted with black, posteriorly broader than in imperialis, yellow as far 
as the 3 rd radial and beyond, marginal teeth longer. Upper Tenasserim: Toungoo, January to April; in the 
Tring Museum 2 GG and 1 £> inclusive of the name-types (<$%). 
5. Genus: Ariisaiidia Blanch. 
This genus differs from Papilio principally in having the median spur of the forewing only very weakly 
indicated. It belongs to the essentially Palaearctic subfamily Thaidinae (or Zerynthiinae). 
Body with rough hairs, weak in proportion to the size of the wings; head small; palpi pointed, pro¬ 
jecting; antenna scaleless, thin, short, with weak club, the sensory hairs dense at the base of the segments on 
the underside; abdomen long, thickest in the posterior half; legs short. Wings long, forewing rounded, the 
1 st and 2 nd subcostal free, the 3 rd —5 th stalked together, the 1 st radial arising near the upper angle of the cell; hind¬ 
wing long-toothed, with long tail at the 3 ld radial and a shorter one at each of the median veins, precostal vein 
directed basad, basal cell large. — The earlier stages unknown. Two species, in medium to higher elevations 
on the wooded mountains of North India and West China. The butterfly has a feeble flight, recalling Hestia 
and allows itself to be driven backwards and forwards by the wind between the tops of trees like a dry leaf. 
It also visits flowers, and during a shower it sits on a leaf and pushes the forewing over the hindwing, so that 
the brillant colours of the latter are concealed (Doherty). From the spring to September. The sexes similar. 
A. lidderdalei. Black with grey lines, as may be seen from the figure. Hindwing from the 2 nd radial 
to the abdominal margin with large brighUcoloured area, which is proximally rose-red and distally black and 
is bordered by yellow patches; on the black part two bluish grey spots, which bear basally a white line or 
dot; tail obtusely pointed, not spatulate as in the Chinese species A. thaidina. Beneath similar to above, 
the markings larger, the rose-red area paler, The $ somewhat larger than the <$. North India and West China. 
— lidderdalei Atkins. (49 c). The cell-lines of the forewing only very slightly curved, the blue-grey spots on lidderdalei. 
the black area of the hindwing large. Bhutan, Naga Hills in North-East Assam, Chin Hills in North-West 
Burma. — spinosa Stick, occurs in West China. 
6. Genus: Parnassius Latr. 
The genus Parnassius is purely Palearctic. We must regard as its original home the Central Asiatic 
mountains, from whence the species spread in the glacial epoch over the whole of non-tropical and non-arctic 
Asia and the non-arctic regions of Europe, and there is no doubt that the North American Parnassiids also 
have found their way across the Alaskan bridge to Alaska and the Rocky Mountains. 
•It is not improbable that originally all the Parnassiids inhabited the lowlands, and some of the species 
only ascended into the higher mountains as the continental ice receded. Certain it is, however, that some 
of the recent species retained the steppe-frequenting habit (abundance of P. mnemosyne in the Hungarian 
Puszta a,nd the steppes on the Volga), whilst the principal contingent belongs to the mountains. The Indian 
species are exclusively mountain-dwellers and even favour preeminently the high alpine regions, which alone, 
at this southernmost limit of their occurrence, can offer them the accustomed conditions of existence. 
But even this southern migration upwards, which has taken place close to the boundary of the tropics 
and to the climatic barrier between the high plateaus of Asia and the hot lowlands of India, has produced no es¬ 
sential modifications in the habitus of the genus. 
The character of the wing-pattern preserves the same scheme as in the purely Palearctic Region, a 
constancy which gives to the Parnassiids the exclusive and uniform stamp by which they are so strikingly dis¬ 
tinguished from their nearest relatives, the Papilionids, which in India more than elsewhere are subject to 
essential variations in the contour of the wings and scheme of markings. 
But at the same time the southern slopes of the Himalayas and the mountain ranges adjoining them 
on the north produce those forms which are conspicuous as the most brightly coloured ( hardwichi ) or the most 
ornamentally marked ( charltonius ) among all the species. 
