122 Citations
The ABRI holdings of Acraea (Nymphalidae) have been catalogued and sum up to 45654 specimens and are the second most complete holdings in the world after www.acraea.com run by D. Bernaud (France) which number over 50000 specimens. ABRI and Bernaud work in close collaboration since 2021 and have published independent Acraea research papers. In this Data collection, we have followed the Pierre Bernaud arrangement of Acraea Actinote series of Butterflies of the World: Series Erich Bauer and Thomas Frankenbach part 31. Pierre Bernaud Nymphalidae XVI. Acraea, subgenus Actinote, 2009 and Nymphalidae XXIII Acraea subgenus Acraea 2013 The Acraeainae are mainly Afrotropical 240 species and 72 subspecies. 5 species, from Indo Australian region and the genus Actinote 58 species of Neotropical origin In 2019 A.P. Carvalho et al wrote a paper entitled is sexual conflict a driver of speciation? A case study with a tribe of Brush-footed butterflies and they used the genera Acraea and its closely related Asian family Cethosia. The Baysian diversification rate analysis splits the Neotropical Actinote very neatly also the ex Bemitestis group is very old and distinct. They is an ongoing work on the generic status of the group Acraea but until such publication is in press and accepted by the Lepidoptera specialists, we prefer to retain the Pierre Bernaud arrangement and will retain phylogeny and alter the Acraea collection accordingly but for now all Acraeainae from Africa are considered as Acraea. The ABRI holding consist of all Acraea species but of which six of these are known only from the type specimens and are in the National Museums of London and Oxford in UK and Paris in France. The Carvalho et al work of 2019 shows the division of 7 Paraphyletic genera six of which are African. Whilst we await a revision of the tribe Acraeini. We have retained the Pierre and Bernaud arrangement of 2014. As stated earlier, this is not the Lepidopterists Society of Africa arrangement. The 8 missing species of Acraea in ABRI collection are; Acraea aureola Eltringham, 1911-Angola, Acraea onerata Trimen, 1891 -Angola/Namibia, Acraea lapidorum Pierre, 1988-S. DRC/Angola, Acraea lofua Eltringham, 1911- S. DRC, Acraea comor Pierre, 1992- G. Comoro, Acraea kinduana Pierre, 1979- E. DRC, Acraea actnotina (Lathy, 1903)-Nigeria, Acraea dimonika Bernaud, 2021-Congo. This dataset presents a total of 43,385 specimens of Acraea collected from different countries within the African continent.