Lithobius (Lithobius) inquiriendus Attems, 1951 Figs 6I, 8D Material examined. Syntypes: IRAN ● ♀ NHMW MY10386; “Sabzawaran” (Jiroft); ● 1 immature ♀ NHMW MY3961; “F144”; same collection data as previous. Remarks. The original description of Lithobius inquiriendus was based on two females, NHMW MY3961 and NHMW MY10386, both from Sabzawaran. The type material appears to be a mixture of two species, the larger of the two syntypes (length 10 mm) having the 4+4 forcipular dentition (Fig. 6I), with alternating small and large teeth and a setiform porodont shared with L. iranicus and its proposed synonyms (NHMW MY10386), whereas the slightly smaller syntype has 2+2 teeth as in the original description (NHMW MY3961). The larger syntype has 2+2 gonopod spurs and a bipartite claw (Fig. 8D) (described as unipartite by Attems 1951). Characters that differ between NHMW MY10386 and the specimens assigned to L. iranicus are consistent with the former being immature, i.e., only 41 antennal articles, few ocelli, angulations but no projections on TT11 and 13, relatively few coxal pores with a circular outline (Fig. 8D), and one less gonopod spur, by comparison to the ontogeny of other Lithobius species with large numbers of antennal articles, high coxal pore numbers, and non-round pores (Andersson 1976, 1978). It is possible that L. inquiriendus and L. iranicus are the same species at different ontogenetic stages, in which case L. inquiriendus would be the senior synonym based on page priority. However, because L. inquiriendus is known only from immatures with a large gap in the size of available specimens and because its types were collected far to the south of the range of L. iranicus, we defer formalising a synonymy.

Published as part of Akkari, Nesrine, Macek, Oliver & Edgecombe, Gregory D., 2024, Revision of some historical types of the genus Lithobius Leach, 1814 (Chilopoda, Lithobiomorpha) from the 1949 / 50 Austrian Iran Expedition, with new molecular data for L. iranicus Attems, 1951, pp. 401-422 in Zootaxa 5424 (4) on page 412, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.5424.4.1, http://zenodo.org/record/10821452