Coluber aspis

Krecsák, László, Golay, Philippe, Åhlander, Erik & Cárdenas, Paco, 2025, Taxonomic detectives: unravelling the origins of Linnaeus’s Aspic viper (Vipera aspis) and assessment of the type material with designation of a neotype, Zootaxa 5653 (1), pp. 80-96 : 82-83

Coluber aspis in the Linnaean descriptions

The Aspic viper was described as Coluber Aspis in ‘ Systema Naturae ’ 10th edition ( Linnaeus 1758: 218), (i.e., Coluber aspis spelling corrected according to Article 32.5 of the Code ( ICZN 1999)) ( Fig. 2A ). This Latin description has been translated into English by Kitchell & Dundee (1994). Our comments are included in square brackets.

192. [ COLUBER ] aspis . 146—46 [ventral and subcaudal scales, 146+46=192, the species number] French “aspice”. ♂ [Mars sign, i.e., venomous snake; see Krecsák & Wahlgren 2008]. Lives in France. Reddish, with dark alternate spots flowing together into a band. Like Chersea , but larger.

In ‘ Systema Naturae ’ 12th edition ( Linné 1766: 378), the description of the taxon is almost identical. The exception is the addition of a new citation “ Stróm. Sondm. Col. 146—34.” ( Fig. 2B ), which is a reference to the encyclopaedic work ‘ Physisk og oeconomisk Beskrivelse over Fogderiet SØndmØr, beligende i Bergens Stift i Norge. Oplyst med Landkort og Kobberstykker. FØrste part ’ by Hans Strøm (1762).

The following conjectures can be drawn from these two basic descriptions:

1. Linnaeus either studied a single C. aspis specimen while writing ‘ Systema Naturae ’ 10th edition ( Linnaeus 1758), or had multiple specimens, but based his description upon a single snake, which is therefore the holotype.

2. From the comparative note with Chersea , we can assume that it was an adult snake. Linnaeus (1749) named C. chersea [ Vipera berus ( Linnaeus, 1758) ], or by its Swedish vernacular name ‘ äsping ’, the small (juvenile) reddish adders (snakes of ‘dull red’ colour) found in southern Sweden. The primary syntype of the species was a 26 cm long subadult female ( Krecsák & Wahlgren 2008).

3. The specimen came from France, as the mention ‘ Habitat in Gallia’ clearly indicates.

4. Knowing that the specimen of C. aspis was a venomous snake, as evidenced by the Mars sign ( Krecsák & Wahlgren 2008) and that in France only species from the genus Vipera possess retractable fangs, the subcaudal scales count indicates that the C. aspis described was a male viper.

5. In the updated Amphibia section from ‘ Systema Naturae ’ 12th edition ( Linné 1766), Linnaeus added another specimen under the C. aspis caption. The snake described by Strøm (1762) had 146 ventral scales and 36 subcaudal scales, which indicate that it was probably a female. The geographic area of Sunnmøre in western Norway discussed by Strøm (1762) clearly suggests a misclassified specimen, and the review of this publication confirmed that Strøm referred to a female Common Adder ( V. berus ) (Krecsák 2024).

Figures

FIGURE 2. Description of Coluber aspis in ‘Systema Naturae’. A. 10th edition (Linnaeus 1758). B. 12th edition (Linné 1766).