''Pachnistis craniota'' is a

moth Moths are a paraphyletic group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not butterflies, with moths making up the vast majority of the order. There are thought to be approximately 160,000 species of moth, many of w ...

in the family

Autostichidae Autostichidae is a family of moths in the moth superfamily Gelechioidea. Subfamilies *Autostichinae Le Marchand, 1947 * Deocloninae Hodges, 1998 * Glyphidocerinae Hodges, 1998 *Holcopogoninae Gozmány, 1967 * Oegoconiinae Leraut, 1992 *Symmocinae ...

. It was described by

Edward Meyrick Edward Meyrick (25 November 1854, in Ramsbury – 31 March 1938, at Thornhanger, Marlborough) was an English schoolmaster and amateur entomologist. He was an expert on microlepidoptera and some consider him one of the founders of modern micr ...

in 1913. It is found in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. The

wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingspan of ...

is 12–14 mm. The forewings are bronzy grey or dark purplish fuscous, suffusedly irrorated (sprinkled) with dark fuscous. The hindwings are grey whitish.

References

Endemic moths of South Africa Moths described in 1913 Pachnistis Taxa named by Edward Meyrick {{Autostichinae-stub