Archaeobuthidae Lourenço, 2001

Soleglad, Michael E. & Fet, Victor, 2003, High-level systematics and phylogeny of the extant scorpions (Scorpiones: Orthosterni), Euscorpius 2003 (11), pp. 1-175 : 118

Family Archaeobuthidae Lourenço, 2001 – Extinct.

Type Genus. Archaeobuthus Lourenço, 2001 . – Extinct.

Composition. This monotypic family includes a single monotypic genus, Archaeobuthus .

Geological occurrence. Lower Cretaceous of Lebanon (amber), ca. 125Ma.

Taxonomic history. Lourenço (2001c, 2002b) placed Archaeobuthidae in superfamily Buthoidea . In our opinion, there is no current data which confirms placement of Archaeobuthidae either in Buthoidea , or in parvorder Buthida , as defined here.

Diagnosis. See Lourenço (2001c) for details on the diagnosis of this family.

Discussion. Archaeobuthus is an important fossil since it is the oldest known orthostern taxon since Carboniferous. Soleglad & Fet (2001) indicated that the reported trichobothrial data places Archaeobuthidae as a sister group to all Recent scorpions. Lourenço (2002b: 38) objected that the observed trichobothrial pattern of Archaeobuthus could be incomplete. However, this pattern was originally reported by Lourenço (2001c: 643) as “neobothriotaxy minorante”, i.e. a completely observed set with some “fundamental trichobothria” missing. This implies that the entire set of trichobothria was visible, as assumed by Soleglad & Fet (2001: 4). Another fossil genus, Palaeoburmesebuthus , could also belong to this family (see below).