Phrynocephalus persicus de Filippi, 1863

LECTOTYPE. ZISP 8844; Neotype ZISP 5544.1 (P. p. horvathi), both designated by Melnikov et al. (2013) .

TYPE LOCALITY. “Campagne deserte dall'Armenia fino a Teheran” [along the route between Armenia and Tehran], Iran. For discussion on the type locality, see Melnikov et al. (2013) .

DISTRIBUTION. From the Caucasus (extreme E Anatolia, Armenia, Georgia) SE into Iran.

DISTRIBUTION IN IRAN. Fig. 18. Along the Zagros range from West Azerbaijan and Ardabil south-eastwards up to Fars Prov.

HABITAT. Open gravel or stony plains with scattered bushes, desert steppe with sparse vegetation up to 2700 m a.s.l. (Anderson 1999).

REMARKS. The taxon horvathi is considered a subspecies of P. persicus based on genetic analyses (Solovyeva et al. 2011; see remarks by P. helioscopus). The record from Na`imabad, Semnan Prov. by Nikolsky (1907) is doubtful. Material from S Esfahan and N Fars Prov. requires redetermination due to recent description of P. ananjevae, a species potentially present in these areas.

REFERENCES. Anderson (1999); Sindaco et al. (2000); Melnikov et al. (2008, 2013); Rezazadeh et al. (2010); Arakelyan et al. (2011); Solovyeva et al. (2011).