[1] This is a large (80 mm wingspan) nocturnal Palearctic (including Europe) species which, like most noctuids, is above and with the wings closed drably coloured to aid concealment during the day.

nuptialis Stgr., from Tibet (Ili, Issyk-kul, Ala Tau) and the Altai Mts., has the forewing paler, more gaily marked, the submarginal line white, sharply edged with black; — the subsp.

obscurata Oberth., from Amurland and Askold Island, is a much blacker form than the average European examples, though specimens from several localities in Europe are also dark: — ab.

nov. the hindwing is yellowish white with a faint pink flush; a line example of this, but without locality label, exists in the Felder Collection, and a similar one is recorded by Mr. Tutt in British Noctuae, Vol.

dilutior Schultz the ground colour is generally paler, either brownish yellow with the dark markings slightly darker, or whitish grey with a faint yellowish intermixture; — ab.

nov. shows the red ground colour of the hindwing running out along veins 2 and 1 in the shape of sharp wedge-shaped teeth, almost interrupting the black median band which is swollen between them into a large horseshoe-shaped blotch; the single example in the Tring Museum is unfortunately without locality; — a strange, probably accidental, aberration from Munich, figured as ab.

narrowly to inner margin towards base; the black terminal border projecting basewards as long narrow teeth along the veins with the red ground colour running up between them.