Arachnologische Mitteilungen 57

6 A. Zamani, Y. M. Marusik, M. Soofi, S. Koponen, J. T. D. Caleb & A. Šestáková it on tall trees of southern tropical dry deciduous forests. Mi- sidentified specimens have been recorded from orange fields (Keswani 2015) and in comparatively dry areas (Rajoria 2015). Discussion The determination of Poltys species using morphological cha- racters only seems to be problematic due to cryptic taxa, in­ traspecific morphological variation, clinal variation and poly- morphism (Smith 2006). Additionally, most of the described species still have an undescribed sex (WSC 2018) and yet, for accurate identification, males are necessary. Based on present knowledge, the Poltys specimen from Iran is conspecific with P . nagpurensis .This identification was also confirmed by H. Smith (pers. comm.). However, compa- rison of the habitus of the Iranian specimen and the holotype of P. nagpurensis may indicate that they could belong to two different species. The female from Iran has considerably lar- ger opisthosomal humps, a more slender carapace and a lon- ger eye tubercle. However, according to Smith (pers. comm.) opisthosomal humps, shape of the carapace and eye position are so variable that they are not reliable characters for diagno- sis. On the other hand, the epigyne is almost identical to that of the holotype of P. nagpurensis . Some differences are pro- bably caused by intraspecific variability and also by the angle of observation.The last situation is demonstrated on the type specimen (Fig. 3g–h).The black arrows point to the different shape of the epigynal plate, which was caused by the slightly different dorso-ventral position of the epigyne. The most similar species, P. illepidus , has a rather wide distribution, known from India to Japan and south to Aus­ tralia (WSC 2018). However, Smith (2006) doubted the con- specificity of Australian and Japanese populations, as well as populations from Sri Lanka and India.This statement is also supported by comparing other figures of copulatory organs from Japan by Tanikawa (2007: fig. 758) and from India by Keswani (2015) and Rajoria (2015). Considering the epigyne, P. nagpurensis from India seems to be misidentified as P. illepi- dus , but the species affinity of Japanese P. illepidus is unknown and requires further consideration. Acknowledgements We are grateful towards Meysam Ghasemi for providing us with the collected specimen. Our thanks also go to Dr. Helen Smith for her help with identification and valuable comments on morphological characters. We are grateful to Dr. Kailash Chandra, Director, Zoo- logical Survey of India, Kolkata for permitting the examination of the type specimen. We are also thankful to reviewers and editors for improving an earlier version of the manuscript. Fig. 2: Holotype of Poltys nagpurensis . a–b. habitus, dorsal and ventral; c–d. chelicerae, internal, black arrow shows small promarginal tooth; e–g. pro- soma, dorsal, lateral and frontal