Sphaeropoeus Brandt 1833
Creators: name: Wesener, Thomas
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2016
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Diplopoda
Sphaerotheriida
Zephronidae
Sphaeropoeus

description: Sphaeropoeus Brandt, 1833
Sphaeropoeus Brandt, 1833: 199.
Tonkinobelum Verhoeff, 1924: 58 (synonymized by Jeekel 1974: 46) Pantitherium Attems, 1932: 7 (synonymized by Jeekel 1974: 46) Lissosphaera Attems, 1943: 62 (synonymized by Jeekel 1974: 46)
Sphaeropoeus — Brandt 1833: 199 (first description).— Brandt 1841: 364 (description).— Gervais 1847: 83 (list).— C.L. Koch 1847: 38 (description).— Pocock 1894: 326 (new species).— Pocock 1895: 412 (new species).— Silvestri 1896: 205.— Flower 1901: 7 (new species).— Attems 1914: 142 (list).— Verhoeff 1924: 59 (list).— Attems 1926: 120 (list).— Attems 1928: 203 (list).— Attems 1935: 130 (list).— Attems 1936: 152 (list).— Attems 1943: 61 (list).— Attems 1953: 155 (list).— Jeekel 1971: 28 (list).— Jeekel 1974: 46 (classification).— Hoffman 1976: 119 (list).—Hoffman 1980: 63 (list).— Hugot et al. 1991: 65 (parasites).— Jeekel 2001: 22 (list).— Mauriès 2001: 140 (list).—Wesener & VandenSpiegel 2009: 551 (morphological phylogenetic analysis).— Wesener 2015: 375 (list).
Synonyms:
Tonkinobelum — Verhoeff 1924: 58 (first description).— Attems 1926: 120 (list).— Attems 1928: 203 (list).— Verhoeff 1928: 1384 (description).— Attems 1935: 128 (list).— Attems 1936: 152 (list).— Attems 1943: 62 (list); Jeekel 1971: 29 (list).— Jeekel 1974: 46 (synonymization).— Hoffman 1976: 119 (list).—Hoffman 1980: 63 (list). Type species: Tonkinobelum maculatum Verhoeff, 1924.
Pantitherium — Attems 1932: 7 (first description).— Attems 1935: 131 (list).— Attems 1943: 63 (list).— Attems 1953: 155 (list).—Jeekel 1971: 27 (list).— Jeekel 1974: 46 (synonymization).
Type species: Pantitherium lugubre Attems, 1932.
Lissosphaera — Attems 1943: 62 (first description).—Jeekel 1971: 26 (list).— Jeekel 1974: 46 (synonymization). Type species: Lissosphaera speciosa Attems, 1943.
Distribution. Mainly Sumatra (13 of 20 species), few species also in Borneo (2), Java (1), Nias (1), Singapore (1), Peninsular Malaysia (2), and a dubious record (see Jeekel 2001, Enghoff et al. 2004) from Vietnam.
……continued on the next page Description. 20–50 mm long. Apical male antennomere axe-shaped, with>70, up to 180 apical cones (record number in the order, and of all Diplopoda). Anal shield locking carinae of variable number, length, and position. Tarsi of legs 3–21 with a single apical spine, rarely two. Coxae in the analyzed species with a wide coxal process. Posterior telopods with four telopoditomeres; immovable finger (telopoditomere 2) slender, with two membranous processes, usually shorter than movable finger. Telopoditomere 3 with small sclerotized teeth and a white ledge. Telopoditomere 4 in some species with spines, always with a membranous ledge, always lacking teeth. Anterior telopod with four podomeres distal to syncoxite. General shape in the few analyzed species of the genus variable. A specially shaped lateral process of telopoditomere 2 and a process of telopoditomere 3 form a clamp (Figs 1 A–C). Genus difficult to distinguish from Tigridosphaera Jeekel, 2000 and Prionobelum Verhoeff, 1924.
Type-species: Sphaeropoeus hercules Brandt, 1833 by monotypy.
Other species included (19):
Sphaeropoeus extinctus Silvestri, 1895 (Malaysia, Indonesia: Nias) Sphaeropoeus gisleni (Verhoeff, 1939) (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus lugubris (Attems, 1932) (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus maculatus Verhoeff, 1924 (Vietnam? Mislabeled according to Jeekel 2001) Sphaeropoeus magnus Chamberlin, 1921 (Borneo: Sarawak) Sphaeropoeus malaccanus Verhoeff, 1910 -1914 (Singapore) Sphaeropoeus modiglianii Silvestri, 1895 (Sumatra, Malay Peninsula) Sphaeropoeus pellitus (Attems, 1943) (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus politus (Attems, 1935) (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus punctulatissimus Silvestri, 1897 (Sumatra) Sphaeropoeus speciosus (Attems, 1943) (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus stollii Pocock, 1895 (Java)
Sphaeropoeus sumatrensis (Chamberlin, 1945) (Sumatra) Sphaeropoeus tatusiaeformis Daday, 1889 (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus tigratus Silvestri, 1897 (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus tuberculosus Karsch, 1881 (Borneo)
Sphaeropoeus unciger (Attems, 1943) (Sumatra)
Sphaeropoeus variegatus Pocock, 1895 (unknown)
Sphaeropoeus velutinus Carl, 1906 (Sumatra)
description: Published as part of Wesener, Thomas, 2016, Redescription and phylogenetic analysis of the type species of the giant pill-millipede genus Sphaeropoeus Brandt, 1833 (Diplopoda, Sphaerotheriida, Zephroniidae), pp. 141-157 in Zootaxa 4184 (1) on pages 146-150, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4184.1.9, http://zenodo.org/record/164535