Archaeidae

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Archaeidae
Austrarchaea sp.

Austrarchaea sp.

Systematics
Class : Arachnids (arachnida)
Order : Spiders (Araneae)
Subordination : Real spiders (Araneomorphae)
Partial order : Entelegynae
Superfamily : Archaeoidea
Family : Archaeidae
Scientific name
Archaeidae
CL Koch & Berendt , 1854

The Archaeidae are a spider family of the real spiders and comprise four genera and 71 species . (As of December 2016)

distribution

Most of the species in this spider family are native to Madagascar . Leon Lotz found and described Eriauchenius cornutus in South Africa in 2003 , while all other Eriauchenius species have so far only been found in Madagascar. Afrarchaea species live in South Africa and Madagascar and the Austrarchaea species are found in Australia .

description

The individual species are not easily recognizable as spiders by laypeople because of their unusual shape and specialized anatomy. They have developed a front body lengthened into a "neck" and greatly elongated jaw claws so that the spiders, which are only two to five millimeters away, are reminiscent of a praying mantis catching prey. Their English name pelican spiders also refers to this external shape. Another English name is assassin spiders ("murderer spiders" or " assassin spiders "), because their extended jaw claws enable them to prey on other spiders. When catching prey, they do not use fishing nets.

Fossils

The first known representatives are finds preserved in amber from the Eocene (approx. 50 million years old) in Europe ( Baltic Sea and Bitterfeld ) from 1854. These fossils were supplemented by David Penney's amber finds in Myanmar in 2002, which included Afrarchaea grimaldii , whose estimated age is 88 to 95 million years ( Cretaceous ). These finds are considered further evidence that spiders were not significantly affected by the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous Period. The first living individuals were not found until 1881.

Systematics

In 1995, the genus Periegops , which is native to Australia and New Zealand, was separated from the Archaeidae by Raymond Forster and assigned to a separate family Periegopidae .

The World Spider Catalog lists five genera and more than 80 species for the Archaeidae. (As of May 2020)

Web links

Commons : Archaeidae  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Archaeidae in the World Spider Catalog

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Natural History Museum of the Burgergemeinde Bern: World Spider Catalog Version 17.5 - Archaeidae . Retrieved December 26, 2016.
  2. ↑ California Academy of Sciences research ( Memento from October 19, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) "
  3. ^ David Penney (2003): Afrarchaea grimaldii, new species of Archaeidae (Araneae) in Cretaceous Burmese amber. Journal of Arachnology 31, pp. 122-130. ( PDF ; 194 kB)
  4. ^ Raymond R. Forster (1995): The Australasian spider family Periegopidae Simon, 1893 (Araneae: Sicarioidea). Records of the Western Australian Museum, Supplement No. 52, pp. 91-105.