''Antheraea roylei'' is a large

moth Moths are a group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not Butterfly, butterflies. They were previously classified as suborder Heterocera, but the group is Paraphyly, paraphyletic with respect to butterflies (s ...

in the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Saturniidae Saturniidae, members of which are commonly named the saturniids, is a family of Lepidoptera with an estimated 2,300 described species. The family contains some of the largest species of moths in the world. Notable members include the emperor m ...

occurring in

Nepal Nepal, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mainly situated in the Himalayas, but also includes parts of the Indo-Gangetic Plain. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China Ch ...

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Burma Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and ha ...

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

, West

Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...

, and the

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n regions of

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

.Richard S. Peigler, Bhuban Ch. Chutia. (2013) Case 3635 - ''Antheraea roylei'' Moore, 1859 (Insecta, Lepidoptera, saturniidae): proposed conservation. The Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature, 70(4):221-228. The species is considered to be the wild progenitor of the domesticated species known as ''

Antheraea pernyi ''Antheraea pernyi'', the Chinese oak tussar moth, Chinese tasar moth, or temperate tussar moth, is a large moth in the family Saturniidae. The species was first described by Félix Édouard Guérin-Méneville in 1855. '' Antheraea roylei'' is an ...

''; the theory is that ''pernyi'' may have evolved from ancestral ''A. roylei'' by

chromosome rearrangement In genetics, a chromosomal rearrangement is a mutation that is a type of chromosome abnormality involving a change in the structure of the native chromosome. Such changes may involve several different classes of events, like Deletion (genetics), d ...

during domestication.

Taxonomic status

A 2013 application to the

International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature The International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) is an organization dedicated to "achieving stability and sense in the scientific naming of animals". Founded in 1895, it currently comprises 26 commissioners from 20 countries. Orga ...

, acting on the presumption that ''A. roylei'' and ''A. pernyi'' are the same biological species, asked to give precedence to the junior name (''roylei''), as it is a wild taxon and not the result of domestication. However, the 2018 Opinion on this application ruled that any authors who believe that ''A. roylei'' (spelled that way rather than "''roylii''") and ''A. pernyi'' are the same species must use the older name, ''pernyi'', as the valid name, despite its origin as a taxon of artificial origin, in large part because other researchers had come forward and claimed that the genetic evidence clearly showed that the two taxa were not conspecific.ICZN (2018) Opinion 2415 (Case 3635) – ''Antheraea roylei'' Moore, 1859 (Insecta, Lepidoptera, Saturniidae): specific name not conserved when considered synonymous with that of the supposed wild progenitor ''Antheraea pernyi'' (Guérin-Méneville, 1855). The Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature, 75(1):187-189.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15737269 r Moths of Asia Sericulture Moths described in 1859