# Lycodon

Lycodon is a genus of colubrid snakes, commonly known as wolf snakes. The Neo-Latin name Lycodon is derived from the Greek words λύκος (lykos) meaning wolf and οδόν (odon) meaning tooth, and refers to the fang-like anterior maxillary and mandibular teeth. They are nonvenomous, but many members of this genus strongly resemble the venomous kraits in appearance, an example of Emsleyan mimicry.

## Fossil record

Fossils of Lycodon are known from the Early Pliocene of Henan.

## Species

The genus Lycodon comprises 73 recognized species.
* Lycodon albofuscus (A.M.C. Duméril, Bibron & A.H.A. Duméril, 1854) – dark wolf snake
* Lycodon alcalai Ota & Ross, 1994 – Alcala's wolf snake
* Lycodon anakradaya A.T. Nguyen, Duong, Wood & Grismer, 2022
* Lycodon anamallensis Günther, 1864 – Colombo wolf snake
* Lycodon aulicus (Linnaeus, 1758) – Indian wolf snake, common wolf snake
* Lycodon banksi Luu et al., 2018 – Banks's wolf snake
* Lycodon bibonius Ota & Ross, 1994 – Ota's wolf snake
* Lycodon bicolor (Nikolsky, 1903) – Mackinnon's wolf snake
* Lycodon butleri Boulenger, 1900 – Butler's wolf snake
* Lycodon capucinus F. Boie, 1827 – common wolf snake
* Lycodon cardamomensis Daltry & Wüster, 2002
* Lycodon carinatus (Kuhl, 1820) – Ceylon wolf snake
* Lycodon cathaya J. Wang, Qi, Lyu, Zeng & Y.-Y. Wang, 2020 – Huaping wolf snake
* Lycodon cavernicolus Grismer et al., 2011 – Gua Wang Burma wolf snake
* Lycodon chapaensis (Angel & Bourret, 1933) – Namdong wolf snake
* Lycodon chithrasekarai Wickramasinghe et al., 2020 – Chithrasekara's bridle snake
* Lycodon chrysoprateros Ota & Ross, 1994 – Ross's wolf snake
* Lycodon davidi G. Vogel et al., 2012 – David's wolf snake
* Lycodon davisonii (Blanford, 1878) – Blanford's bridal snake
* Lycodon deccanensis Ganesh, Deuti, Punith, Achyuthan, Mallik, Adhikari & G. Vogel, 2020
* Lycodon dumerili (Boulenger, 1893) – Duméril's wolf snake
* Lycodon effraenis Cantor, 1847 – brown wolf snake
* Lycodon fasciatus (J. Anderson, 1879)
* Lycodon fasciolatus (Shaw, 1802) – banded wolf snake
* Lycodon fausti Gaulke, 2002 – Faust's wolf snake
* Lycodon ferroni Lanza, 1999 – Ferron's Asian wolf snake
* Lycodon flavicollis Mukherjee & Bhupathy, 2007 – yellow-collared wolf snake
* Lycodon flavomaculatus Wall, 1907 – yellow-spotted wolf snake
* Lycodon flavozonatus (Pope, 1928) – yellow-banded big tooth snake, yellow-spotted wolf snake, big-tooth snake
* Lycodon futsingensis (Pope, 1928)
* Lycodon gammiei (Blanford, 1878) – Gammie's wolf snake, Sikkim false wolf snake
* Lycodon gibsonae G. Vogel & David, 2019 – Gibson's wolf snake
* Lycodon gongshan G. Vogel & Luo, 2011 – Gongshan wolf snake
* Lycodon gracilis (Günther, 1864) – scarce bridal snake
* Lycodon hypsirhinoides (Theobald, 1868)
* Lycodon jara (Shaw, 1802) – twin-spotted wolf snake
* Lycodon kundui M.A. Smith, 1943
* Lycodon laoensis Günther, 1864 – Laotian wolf snake
* Lycodon liuchengchaoi Zhang et al., 2011
* Lycodon meridionalis (Bourret, 1935)
* Lycodon muelleri A.M.C. Duméril, Bibron & A.H.A. Duméril, 1854 – Müller's wolf snake
* Lycodon multifasciatus (Maki, 1931)
* Lycodon multizonatus (Zhao & Y.-M. Jiang, 1981) – Luding wolf snake, Luding Kukri snake
* Lycodon namdongensis Luu, Ziegler, Ha, Le & Hoang, 2019
* Lycodon nympha (Daudin, 1803) – Vellore bridal snake
* Lycodon obvelatus K. Wang, Yu, G. Vogel & Che, 2020 – recluse wolf snake
* Lycodon ophiophagus G. Vogel et al., 2009 – snake-eater wolf snake
* Lycodon orientalis (Hilgendorf, 1880) – Oriental odd-tooth snake
* Lycodon paucifasciatus Rendahl in M.A. Smith, 1943 – Rendahl's wolf snake
* Lycodon philippinus Griffin, 1909 – Philippine dryocalamus
* Lycodon pictus Janssen, Pham, Ngo, Le, T.Q. Nguyen & Ziegler, 2019
* Lycodon rosozonatus (Hu & Zhao, 1972) – rose big-tooth snake
* Lycodon rufozonatus Cantor, 1842 – red-banded snake
* Lycodon ruhstrati (Fischer, 1886) – mountain wolf snake, Formosa wolf snake
* Lycodon sealei Leviton, 1955 – Seale's banded Asian wolf snake
* Lycodon semicarinatus (Cope, 1860) – Loo-Choo big-tooth snake, Ryukyu odd-tooth snake
* Lycodon septentrionalis (Günther, 1875) – white-banded wolf snake, northern large-toothed snake
* Lycodon serratus K. Wang, Yu, G. Vogel & Che, 2020 – serrate-banded wolf snake
* Lycodon sidiki Wostl, Hamidy, Kurniawan & E.N. Smith, 2017
* Lycodon solivagus Ota & Ross, 1994 – common wolf snake
* Lycodon stormi Boettger, 1892 – Sulawesi wolf snake
* Lycodon striatus (Shaw, 1802) – northern wolf snake, barred wolf snake
* Lycodon subannulatus (A.M.C. Duméril, Bibron & A.H.A. Duméril, 1854) – Malayan bridal snake, southern bridle snake
* Lycodon subcinctus F. Boie, 1827 – Malayan banded wolf snake
* Lycodon synaptor G. Vogel & David, 2010 – Boehme's wolf snake
* Lycodon tessellatus Jan, 1863 – Manila wolf snake
* Lycodon tiwarii Biswas & Sanyal, 1965 – Andaman wolf snake
* Lycodon travancoricus (Beddome, 1870) – Travancore wolf snake
* Lycodon tristrigatus Günther, 1858
* Lycodon truongi A.T. Nguyen, Duong, Wood & Grismer, 2022 – Truong's wolf snake
* Lycodon zawi Slowinski et al., 2001 – Zaw's wolf snake
* Lycodon zayuensis K. Jiang, Wang, Jin & Che, 2020
* Lycodon zoosvictoriae Neang et al., 2014 – Zoos Victoria's wolf snake
Nota bene: A binomial authority in parentheses indicates that the species was originally described in a genus other than Lycodon.
In 2024, an other species of lycodon was discovered: lycodon neomaculatus, the Indochinese Banded Wolfsnake.