European hare
The Ethiopian highland hare was first described by the French zoologist Francis Petter in 1963. It was originally described as a subspecies of the cape hare ("Lepus capensis"), but was later given a species status by Renate Angermann in 1983. In 1987, Maria Luisa Azzaroli-Puccetti also listed the Ethiopian highland hare as a separate species, although she suggested it to be a primitive form of the European hare ("Lepus europaeus"), and is closely related to it, due to the similarity of their skulls. She mentioned that after an interglacial period, the retraction of glaciers Might have isolated the populations of the European hare on the Ethiopian plateau, which evolved as a different subspecies. Thus, the scientific name she suggested was "L. europaeus starcki".