''Battus zetides'', the zetides swallowtail, is a species of

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The group comprises ...

in the family

Papilionidae Swallowtail butterflies are large, colorful butterflies in the family Papilionidae, and include over 550 species. Though the majority are tropical, members of the family inhabit every continent except Antarctica. The family includes the larges ...

. It is found in

Haiti Haiti (; ht, Ayiti ; French: ), officially the Republic of Haiti (); ) and formerly known as Hayti, is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and ...

and the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with ...

. ''Battus zetides'' has on the upper surface of both wings a yellowish band, and on the under surface of the hindwing a silver band. Known only from high elevations in Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Said to be "locally common under the right conditions and at the right times of year" but regarded also as a rare species. It is represented in few collections and specimens are sold at high prices. Originally described as ''zetes'' (Westwood, 1847) as the common name suggests. This name had already been used by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, ...

for '' Papilio zetes'' Linnaeus, 1758 and had to be replaced as it was a junior

homonym In linguistics, homonyms are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation), or homophones (equivocal words, that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both. Using this definition, ...

References

Sources

*Lewis, H. L., 1974 ''Butterflies of the World'' Page 23, figure 5 (as ''zetes'') *Edwin Möhn, 2002 ''Schmetterlinge der Erde, Butterflies of the World'' Part V (5), Papilionidae II:Battus. Edited by Erich Bauer and Thomas Frankenbach Keltern : Goecke & Evers ; Canterbury : Hillside Books. Illustrates and identifies 14 species and 49 subspecies. Plate 1, figures 1-4. zetides Fauna of Hispaniola Butterflies of the Caribbean Vulnerable animals Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Butterflies described in 1971 {{papilionidae-stub