Lepidopterology

Lepidopterology (from Ancient Greek λεπίδος (lepídos) 'scale' πτερόν (pterón) 'wing' and -λογία (-logia)[1]) is a branch of entomology concerning the scientific study of moths and the two superfamilies of butterflies.

When Linnaeus wrote the tenth edition of the Systema Naturae in 1758, there was already "a substantial body of published work on Lepidopteran natural history" (Kristensen, 1999).

Following Linnaeus' descriptions in Systema Naturae and with Boas Johansson in Centuria Insectorum, the Austrian Nikolaus Poda von Neuhaus wrote Insecta Musei Graecensis (1761) and Johann Christian Fabricius described very many more species in a series of major works.

In the mid-century period, the expert knowledge of Lepidoptera dealers such as Otto Staudinger, Emile Deyrolle, Orazio Querci, and Peter Godeffroy contributed to the field.

In Russia, Andrey Avinoff,[3] a member of the diplomatic corps of Tsar Nicholas II, sponsored more than forty collecting expeditions to Central Asia in search of rare Lepidoptera.

They brought back to France, according to Antoine François, comte de Fourcroy, the largest collection Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle had ever received including 44 crates of zoological specimens.

Francis Walker, Alois Friedrich Rogenhofer, František Antonín Nickerl, Lionel de Nicéville, Carl Heinrich Hopffer and Arthur Gardiner Butler.

Some notable lepidopterists are or have been: As the chief mode of study of butterflies was through pinned specimen collections, it was difficult to catalogue and communicate names and descriptions widely.

([1]) Avinoff's groundbreaking research on the biogeography of speciation demonstrated how members of the genus Karanasa evolved into separate species in isolated mountain valleys in the Pamir Range.

He collaborated with his colleague Walter Sweadner, a curator of entomology at the Carnegie Museum, on a monograph, The Karanasa Butterflies, A Study in Evolution.