Palaeonympha Butler, 1871

Zhang, Jing, Cong, Qian, Shen, Jinhui, Opler, Paul A. & Grishin, Nick V., 2020, Genomic evidence suggests further changes of butterfly names, The Taxonomic Report of the International Lepidoptera Survey 8 (7), pp. 1-41 : 22-24

Palaeonympha Butler, 1871 is a subgenus of Megisto Hübner, [1819]

Cissia cleophes (Godman & Salvin, 1889) does not belong to Megisto Hübner, [1819] Hyponephele Muschamp, 1915 is a subgenus of Cercyonis Scudder, 1875

In the genomic tree (Fig. 18), Hyponephele Muschamp, 1915 (type species Papilio lycaon Rottemburg, 1775 ) is sister to Cercyonis Scudder, 1875 (type species Papilio alope Fabricius, 1793 , placed as a subspecies of Papilio pegala Fabricius, 1775 ), in agreement with previous findings ( Peña et al. 2006). The tree reveals that the genetic divergence between Hyponephele and Cercyonis is smaller than that within Erebia Dalman, 1816 (type species Papilio ligea Linnaeus, 1758 ). The COI barcodes of H. lycaon and C. pegala differ by 7.9% (52 bp). We give

Hyponephele a new status of a subgenus within

Cercyonis . This change may not be welcomed by the

Old World Lepidopterists who are used to the name

Hyponephele applied to its many species, similar to how Argynnis is not welcomed in America to include

Speyeria as its subgenus. However, this name change highlights the close relationship between the two subgenera ( Hyponephele and Cercyonis ) making

Cercyonis a Holarctic genus, similar to Erebia

Dalman, 1816 (type species Papilio ligea Linnaeus, 1758 ) in divergence and distribution. This is yet another step towards more internally consistent genus-level classification in butterflies.