Victoriana attenuata Miranda & Skevington & Marshall 2020

Victoriana attenuata species group Description. Body brown (Fig. 50). Head. Face narrow (between 1/4 to ~1/3 of head width), entirely pale; tubercle dorsally positioned. Antennal insertions confluent. Dorsal occiput with 1 row of pile. Thorax. Scutum pale laterally, and without distinct anterior row of pile. Scutellum pale. Anterior anepisternum pilose. Katatergite with short microtrichia that gives the sclerite a ‘velvet’ appearance. Metaepisternum pilose. Metasternum bare. Upper calypter margin with pile much shorter than pile on the ventral calypter margin. Wing. Alula absent. Wing hyaline (Fig. 50). Abdomen. Abdomen slightly petiolate, narrow and elongated, sometimes petiolate; terga 3 and 4 with medial, pale, triangular maculae that might be incised posteriorly or fully divided medially into two short stripes (Fig. 50). Terminalia. Male postgonite apical margin straight and with dorsal and ventral apical acute extremities (Fig. 56); surstylus with homogenously distributed setulae ventrally; hypandrium with pile sub-apically on ventro-lateral surface; basiphallus teardrop-shaped, distiphallus membranous with dorsal sclerotized triangular region (similar to Fig. 97). Included species (8). V. attenuata (Williston, 1891) comb. nov. [1b], V. duida (Hull, 1947a) comb. nov. [1b], V. mentor (Curran, 1930a) comb. nov. [1b], V. oblonga (Walker, 1852) comb. nov. [1b], V. sagittifera (Austen, 1893) comb. nov. [1b], V. sativa (Curran, 1941) comb. nov. [1b], V. selene (Hull, 1949a) comb. nov. [1a], V. zilla (Hull, 1943b) comb. nov. [1b]. Comments. The V. attenuata species group can be further distinguished from the V. melanorrhina species group by the frons with only sparse microtrichia [microtrichia concentrated laterally in the V. melanorrhina species group (similar as in Fig. 86)], hypandrium oval in dorsal profile [trapezoidal in the V. melanorrhina species group (Fig. 99)] and postgonite with straight apical margin (convex (fig. 55) or extended ventro-apically (Fig. 54) in the V. melanorrhina species group). Victoriana oblonga (Fig. 77) and V. zilla (Fig. 50) were previously allocated to the O. lepidus group (Mengual et al. 2018) but characters visible on the type specimen images, including shape of their abdominal segments, colour pattern, and lack of alula, indicate that it belongs in Victoriana. Furthermore, it is likely that V. sativa (described on the basis of a male specimen, Fig. 89) is a junior synonym of V. oblonga (described on the basis of a female specimen, Fig. 77), although the type of the latter is too damaged to fully compare to the former. The V. attenuata species group (Fig. 50) resembles some Nuntianus species (Figs 34–36), in that the subepandrial sclerite has apical extensions (Fig. 53) similar to those in Nuntianus, however the sub-epandrial sclerite overall is different, and this resemblance is probably superficial. The hypandrium of the V. attenuata species group also has ventral pile sub-apically (Fig. 56) as in Nuntianus, but this feature also occurs with slight variations in some species of Fragosa, Hybobathus, Maiana, Mimocalla Hull, 1943a, Pelecinobaccha Shannon, 1927 [P. alucard Miranda in Miranda et al., 2014, P. dracula (Hull, 1943f)], Relictanum Miranda in Miranda et al., 2014 [R. braziliensis (Curran, 1939), R. magisadspersum Miranda in Miranda et al., 2014, R. nero (Curran, 1939), R. schwarzi (Curran, 1939)], Styxia, and the other groups of Victoriana (e.g. Fig. 99). This group differs most markedly from Nuntianus species in having a postgonite with straight apical margin and with apico-dorsal and apico-ventral extremities acute and strongly produced (Fig. 56).

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