MARQUES ET AL.; AMPHIBIANS AND TERRESTRIAL REPTILES OF ANGOLA 
29 
were studied and published on by Boulenger on four different oceasions (Boulenger 1905, 1907a,b, 
1915) . The importance of Ansorge’s collections is reflected in the great number of descriptions 
based on them: Arthroleptis xenochirus Boulenger, 1905, Arthroleptis (currently Phrynobatrachus) 
parvulus Boulenger, 1905, Rana (cunQntly Ptychadena) bunoderma Boulenger, 1907a, Rana (cur¬ 
rently Tomopterna) cryptotis Boulenger, 1907b, Psammophis ansorgii Boulenger, 1905, Causus 
bUineatus Boulenger, 1905, Phyllodactylus (currently Afrogecko) ansorgii Boulenger, 1907a, 
Mabuia (currently Trachylepis) laevis Boulenger, 1907a, Mabuia (currently Trachylepis) ansorgii 
Boulenger, 1907a (currently considered as subspecies of T. sulcata), and Prosymna angolensis 
Boulenger, 1915. 
From the 1910s onwards, several new expeditions led mostly by foreign naturalists resulted in 
important herpetological collections, and were studied and published on by several authors. These 
expeditions were connected to the political momentum of Portugal. After the end of the monarchy 
and implementation of the Republic in 1910, Portugal greatly strengthened its colonial agenda, 
opening the doors to several scientific initiatives to what then was the Colony of Angola. The first 
of these expeditions to explore Angolan territories was co-promoted by the Ministry of Public 
Education and the French Geographic Society and was directed by the Count Jacques de Rohan- 
Chabot (1889-1958). This trip explored the central southern regions of Angola and Rhodesia (cur¬ 
rently Zimbabwe and Zambia) in 1912-1914. The resulting collections were deposited in the 
Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle (MNHN) in Paris, and herpetological results of the expedi¬ 
tion (almost all from Cunene and Cuando Cubango Provinces) were published by Angel (1923) 
who described Typhlacontias rohani. The Swedish naturalist and curator of Goteborgs Naturhis- 
toriska Museum Hilmer Nils Erik Skoog (1870-1927) visited southern Angola, namely Namibe 
Province, in 1912 as part of his two year expedition to Southern Africa (1912-1913). Although his 
interests were in other groups, he collected, or obtained from local collectors, specimens studied 
by the Swedish herpetologist Lars Gabriel Andersson (1868-1951), including the type of the 
remarkable Desert Plated Lizard, Gerrhosaurus skoogi, named in his honor (Andersson 1916). 
During the 1920s and 1930s, Angola came to the attention of some of the major North Amer¬ 
ican natural history institutions, including the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in 
New York, the Academy of Natu¬ 
ral Sciences of Philadelphia 
(ANSP), and the Carnegie Muse¬ 
um (CM) in Pittsburgh. In 1925, 
Arthur S. Vemay (1877-1960) 
organized the Vemay Expedition 
to Angola with the goals of col¬ 
lecting zoological specimens for 
the AMNH, including the iconic 
and mysterious Giant Sable {Hip- 
potragus niger variani Thomas, 
1916) endemic to Malanje 
Province. In addition to Vemay, 
the AMNH taxidermist Herbert 
Lang (1879-1957), the ornithol¬ 
ogist Rudyerd Boulton (1901- 
1983), and Alan and Charles 
Chapman, two young English¬ 
men living in Angola at the time. 
Figure 22. An overview of the field gear and eonditions of the Vemay 
Expedition to Angola (souree Ameriean Museum of Natural History). 
