Spermophilus xanthoprymnus (Bennett, 1835) . Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1835:90.

TYPE LOCALITY: N.E. Turkey, Armenia, Erzerum (=Erzurum) .

DISTRIBUTION: Soviet Transcaucasia, Turkey, Syria, and Palestine.

COMMENT: Subgenus Spermophilus; see Gromov et al., 1965:237. Regarded by Ellerman and Morrison-Scott, 1951:506, and Corbet, 1978:83, as a synonym of citellus; but see Gromov et al., 1965:237, and Vorontsov and Lyapunova, 1970, Byull. Mosk. Ova. Ispyt. Prir. Otd. Biol., 75: 122- 136, who provided evidence of specific distinctness.