''Atrophaneura priapus'', the Priapus batwing or white-head batwing, is a swallowtail butterfly found in

Burma Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

Sumatra Sumatra is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the sixth-largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 (182,812 mi.2), not including adjacent i ...

, and

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's List ...

. The subspecies ''A. p. hageni'' was named to honour

Hermann August Hagen Hermann August Hagen (30 May 1817 – 9 November 1893) was a German entomologist who specialised in Neuroptera and Odonata. He had established himself as one of Europe's preeminent entomologists by 1867 when he accepted a position at Harvard Unive ...

. It may be a full species. ''A. priapus'' is a large butterfly (11–14 cm wingspan). The forewings are black with the wing veins bordered by white. The hindwings are black and have a wavy margin. There is a broad, slightly yellowish white band on the hindwing. This band contains large black spots. In males there is a white area with red edge next to the body. The underside is similar to the upperside, but the white area is missing. The abdomen is yellow and black above. The head (hence the common name white-head batwing) and the underside of abdomen are white or yellow. The thorax is black.

Subspecies

*''Atrophaneura priapus priapus'' west Java *''Atrophaneura priapus dilutus'' (Fruhstorfer, 1895) east Java *''Atrophaneura priapus hageni'' (Rogenhofer, 1889) Sumatra, Indonesia

Biology

''Atrophaneura priapus'' is a ''

Troides ''Troides'' is a genus of birdwing butterflies, comprising species found in the Indian subcontinent, southeast Asia, and Oceania. Species Twenty species are recognized: : subgenus: ''Ripponia'' ::* '' Troides hypolitus'' – Rippon's birdwin ...

mimic MIMIC, known in capitalized form only, is a former simulation computer language developed 1964 by H. E. Petersen, F. J. Sansom and L. M. Warshawsky of Systems Engineering Group within the Air Force Materiel Command at the Wright-Patterson AFB in ...

and is, itself mimicked by females of '' Papilio forbesi''.

Taxonomy

''Atrophaneura priapus'', ''A. priapus hageni'' and '' A. sycorax'', are often confused and may represent one, two or three good species although the hindwing pouches and androconial scales are variously modified.

Status

It is not known to be threatened, though the status is uncertain.

References

External links

Butterflycorner
Images from

Naturhistorisches Museum Wien The Natural History Museum Vienna (german: Naturhistorisches Museum Wien) is a large natural history museum located in Vienna, Austria. It is one of the most important natural history museums worldwide. The NHM Vienna is one of the largest museum ...

Global Butterfly Information System
text and images including

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of several ...

(access via "tree" left) Atrophaneura Butterflies of Indonesia Taxa named by Jean Baptiste Boisduval Butterflies described in 1836 {{Papilionidae-stub