page_title: Polyura athamas
section_title: Variation
hierarchical_section_title: Polyura athamas / Description / Variation
caption_attribution_description: Polyura athamas pupa
context_page_description: Polyura athamas, the common nawab, is a species of fast-flying canopy butterfly found in tropical Asia. It belongs to the Charaxinae in the brush-footed butterfly family.
  It occurs in the Himalayas from Kashmir to Sikkim, the hills of central India and the Eastern Ghats, the Western Ghats and southern India, Sri Lanka, Assam, Cachar, and via Myanmar, Cambodia and the Tenasserim Hills far into Indonesia. In August 2016 a specimen was spotted and caught in Palawan, Philippines.
context_section_description: "The species exhibits considerable seasonal variation, especially in South and North India; for we find that the specimens obtained in March and April in North and North-west India have the discal band much widened and the underside pale, while the individuals flying in May and June have the band narrower, and those found in Sikkim from August to November have it narrowest. In South India there are two well distinguished forms, the one corresponding to the spring form of North India, but with the band less broad and representing most likely the dry-season brood, respectively a form that inhabits dry districts, and the second having the band narrower and the underside brighter in tint. In Burma broad-banded, pale specimens occur also, besides narrow-banded ones......  The differences exhibited by the pale and the narrow-banded forms have often been treated as being of specific value; for instance, the pale South Indian form has been described as E. agrarius, while the darker form is referred to as E. samatha; the North Indian spring form has been designated as E. hamasta, the form May to June as E. bharata, and the summer form as E. athamas.....As the species is so susceptible to climatical differences, it is self-evident that the individuals caught in the same month at the same locality, but in different years, are not always identical in the width of the band, and that, further, in different localities of the same country one may meet with somewhat different forms of athamas in one year, and identical forms in another year. This one must bear in mind in working with the individuals of athamas from a certain country."
  "Messrs. Rothschild and Jordan in their monograph of Charaxes and allied Prionopterous genera divide the forms of athamas (then placed in genus Eulepis) occurring within our limits into two subspecies—(1) E. athamas athamas, the Northern and Eastern race, with three seasonal forms; and (2) E. athamas agrarius, the Southern Indian and Ceylon race, with two seasonal forms. The differences between the subspecies seem to not sufficient to necessitate detailed descriptions in the present work. Following Messrs. Rothschild and Jordan, I keep, with much doubt, however, the next form separate from athamas, of which it is possibly only a dimorph."
  C. & R. Felder described Charaxes bharata in 1867 which was later considered as a synonym of this species. A molecular phylogenetic work (Toussaint et al. 2015) has suggested this to be a distinct species.
caption: Pupa
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