First, to get it out of the way, let's mention that some older lists mention a species Graphium taliensis. This is no longer considered a distinct species. Conveniently, it's now considered a subspecies of Graphium tamerlana (sometimes tamerlanus), which comes next to it alphabetically.
Photo by Zhangqianyi, taken in May at a place whose name Zhangqianyi typed into Inaturalist.org in Chinese. It seems to share that taste so many Graphiums have for the color blue.
Graphium tamerlana is one of those Chinese zebra-striped Swallowtails that are being reclassified. Few web sites are showing much information about it at the time of writing. We can safely say that it was named by Charles Oberthur in 1876. In the tradition of naming Swallowtail species after characters from literature, he named it after a legendary war chief whose name probably sounded something like Demur or Timur. Timur walked with a limp and was called Timur Leng, which both sounds and means something like Timur the Lame. People said the name differently in different places. In the eighteenth century most English-speaking people had read or seen a performance of Marlowe's Tamburlaine, and in the nineteenth century they had read Poe's poem "Tamerlane." Today, since other people use those names, many prefer to call the Mongolian war chief Timur. There is also a butterfly called Graphium timur. We'll meet it in June.
We can safely say that, when Oberthur named the butterfly, some people pointed out that it looked an awful lot like Graphium alebion. Walter Rothschild defended the claim that it was a distinct species:
"
The specimen figured by Elmer {I.e.) is tamerlanus Obeith. and not alebion Gray, and I do not believe that the patria '• Nordchina " which Eimer gives to his alebion (not Gray's) is correct. This mistake in the identification accounts for his considering tamerlanus to be " ein einfacher alebion.''
P. alebion and tamerlanus have the discoidal cell to the hindwings much broader, especially so in its apical half, than any other species of the present group.
The chief characters by which P. alebion and tamerlanus can be distinguished from each other are as follows : —
The hindwings of P. alebion are much more produced in the caudal region, and are, therefore, much narrower than those of P. tamerlanus; the anal yellow mark to the hindwings of P. tamerlanus is at least three times as broad (transversally) as long, and divided (or almost so) into two spots by the black lower median nervule, while in P. alebion that mark is about as long as broad (and therefore much larger than in P. tamerlanus), and not divided into two spots; the postcellular portions of the subbasal and median black lines, which form a very conspicuous angle on both sides of the hindwings, are in P. alebion proportionally shorter than in P. tamerlanus.
Though I have seen a large number of specimens of P. tamerlanus, and have compared about twenty specimens of alebion, I have never met with intermediate examples. The shape of the hindwings and the yellow anal mark are so conspicuously different in alebion and tamerlanus that there is at present no reason to unite these Papilios into one species.
Hah. Western China.
"
Another expert opined that to him Graphium (then Papilio) tamerlanus looked much more like G. glycerion than like Graphium alebion.
So it seems to have been accepted as a species. It seems not to be very common, but so little is known about it that, even about its population size, it's hard to be sure.
Its genus name has been through some changes. At first all Swallowtails were classified as one genus, Papilio. Then that genus list was decluttered by classifying some groups of Swallowtails as separate genera, such as Graphium. The genus names Cosmodesmas and Iphiclides were proposed for this species along the way. Considering how many Graphiums there are and how they seem to fit into a few distinct sub-groups, some want to promote the sub-genus name Pazala into the genus name.
This butterfly has been celebrated on a postage stamp:
It is comfortable at high altitudes, found between about 800 and 1500 m, 2600 and 5000 feet, above sea level.
There are three subspecies: Graphium tamerlana tamerlana is found mostly in Moupin, China; G.t. taliensis is found in Tali and Junnan, China; and G.t. kansuensis is found around Kansu, Tsinglingschan, and Peilingschan, China. This beautiful photo essay does not have space to discuss the differences among subspecies.
Photo by Arex, also in May, also in a place with a Chinese name. It seems to like shallow white flowers. Long though their coiled probosces are, many Swallowtails stick to shallow flowers because their probosces are shorter than other butterflies'.
As in so many cases, little is known about Chinese butterflies. China's focus on economic growth has come at some cost to plant and animal species not found in any other part of the world. It would probably be profitable, in the long run, for Chinese people to study and document their wildlife before they risk destroying its habitat. Graphium tamerlanus and the other black-and-white Graphiums that seem uniquely Chinese are a great big opportunity for Chinese people to become famous.
Photo by Arex, also in May, also in a place with a Chinese name. This one seems to like damp sand, so it's probably a male, sipping bitter or salty water to get the minerals he needs to be able to mate. In the mating process he will transfer a supply of mineral salts to the female, who can thus afford to have more delicate tastes and, in most Swallowtail species, only ever drinks flower nectar and fresh clear water.
And...? Are these butterflies averse to being around others of their kind, as butterflies are when their host plant is scarce, or likely to seek safety in numbers, as butterflies do when their host plant is abundant? Do the eggs, larvae, and pupae look just like Graphium alebion's or Graphium sichuanensis's, or do they surprisingly look more like those of Graphium weiskei? Do the butterflies generally fly for a week, a month, all summer? How many generations do they have in a year? What do they eat? Nobody seems to know.
Who knows how useful it might be for the world to know these things.
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