Maratus linnaei, Waldock, 2008

Otto, Jürgen C. & Hill, David E., 2021, Catalogue of the Australian peacock spiders, Peckhamia 148 (4), pp. 1-35 : 14

The linnaei group

This group contains four species from the southwestern corner of Western Australia, an area of extraordinary biodiversity. Except for M. laurenae , which appears to have some affinity to the mungaich group, males lack flaps and rotate their opisthosoma toward one side and then to the other as they display to attentive females at a distance of less than 4 mm. The opisthosoma of M. linnaei is more tapered or conical, more cylindrical in M. electricus . The opisthosoma bears a darker central pattern and is truncated at the rear in M. cuspis . This group appears to be most closely related to the vespa group, also endemic to this corner of Australia, but members of that group have prominent, lobate flaps.