There are 1,317 recorded species of butterflies found in China. The geography of China is diverse. Temperate North China is located in Central Asia and the Palearctic realm. The rest of China, including the tropical South China (with Hainan, Hong Kong), and Taiwan belong to the Indomalayan realm. In many parts of China the Palearctic and Oriental faunas overlap.
Early work on the butterfly fauna of China was undertaken by European entomologists: Edward Donovan, John Henry Leech, Henry John Elwes, Charles Oberthür, Ernest Grandidier, Otto Staudinger, Hans Fruhstorfer, Alfred Otto Herz, Arthur Poujade, Pierre Joseph Michel Lorquin, Paul Mabille, Sergei Alphéraky and Rudolf Püngeler furnish examples. Thousands of plant, insect and mammal species were described in the 19th century by scientists of the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle, Paris, in connection with permanent settlements of missionaries of the Missions étrangères de Paris in north-west Yunnan. The extreme south of Yunnan province, just to the north of Laos has tropical forests and the biological diversity of this area is the most abundant in China. In the early 20th century the faunal studies of European workers on China were summarised in Die Gross-Schmetterlinge der Erde edited by Adalbert Seitz. In the 1930s, Wong Chi-yu, Chou Io, and Miss NgYukchau published reports on butterfly species in Zhejiang and Guangdong provinces, the Chuankang Area, and Ningbo, respectively. Rudolf Mell, director of the German-Chinese Middle School at Canton (Guangzhou) published notes on butterflies in Beiträge zur Fauna sinica (Deut. ent. Zeit.) and other works. From the 1960s to the 1980s, Lee Chuan-lung published revisionary works and descriptions of a number of new species of butterflies from China. Some of these were collected during Sino-Soviet expeditions to Chinese Central Asia when Chinese entomologists worked with their Russian counterparts. Iconographia Insectorum Shensi-corum: Rhopalocera was published in 1978 by the then Northwestern College of Agriculture. Following that, books on the butterfly fauna of Gansu, Hunan (Chenzhou), Guangxi, Guangdong (Lingnan), Henan and Zhejiang were published and also checklists of the butterflies of Jiangxi, Shandong, Ningxia and Xinjiang. In 1992, The Atlas of Chinese Butterflies was published by Lee Chuan-lung. In 1994, Monographia Rhopalocerorum Sinensium edited by Chou Io was published, summarising studies by forty-nine lepidopterists from all over China, including Hong Kong and Taiwan. In 1996 the Butterfly Association of the Entomological Society of China was founded. It is based in the Northwestern Agricultural University. Chou Io revised Monographia Rhopalocerorum Sinensium in 1998 in Classification and Identification of Chinese Butterflies Field Identification Guide. Other and more recent work appears in Acta Zootaxonomica Sinica
Otto Staudinger was a German entomologist and a natural history dealer considered one of the largest in the world specialising in the collection and sale of insects to museums, scientific institutions, and individuals.
The poplar admiral is a butterfly in the Limenitidine clade of the family Nymphalidae.
Poritia is a genus of lycaenid butterflies. The species of this genus are found in the Indomalayan realm. Poritia was erected by Frederic Moore in 1887.
Nikolay Grigoryevich Erschoff, also Nikolaj Grigor'jevitsch Erschov, Erschow or Yershov was a Russian entomologist mainly interested in Lepidoptera.
Carl Heinrich Michael Ribbe was a German explorer and entomologist.
Parnassius baileyi, or Bailey's Apollo, is a high-altitude butterfly which is found in southwestern China. It is a member of the snow Apollo genus (Parnassius) of the swallowtail family (Papilionidae).
Parnassius labeyriei is a high-altitude butterfly which is found in China. It is a member of the snow Apollo genus Parnassius of the swallowtail family, Papilionidae.
Parnassius schultei is a high-altitude butterfly which is found in Tibet and west China. It is a member of the snow Apollo genus (Parnassius) of the swallowtail family (Papilionidae).
Papilio fuelleborni is a species of swallowtail butterfly from the genus Papilio that is found in Tanzania and Malawi.
Parnassius andreji is a snow butterfly found in China. The species was first described by Curt Eisner in 1930.
Graphium incerta is a butterfly found in China that belongs to the swallowtail family.
Aphantopus arvensis is a butterfly found in the Palearctic that belongs to the browns family. The species was first described by Charles Oberthur in 1876. It is endemic to western and central China.
Rudolf Emil Mell was a German zoologist and entomologist who specialised in Lepidoptera especially Sphingidae and the fauna of China. He was the director of the German-Chinese Middle School at Canton (Guangzhou) for some time. His collection of Sphingidae is held by the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. It was purchased by Benjamin Preston Clark.
Arhopala staudingeri is a species of butterfly in the family Lycaenidae. It was described by Georg Semper in 1890. It is found in the Indomalayan realm, where it is endemic to the Philippines.
Polycaena is a genus of butterflies of the subfamily Nemeobiinae within the family Riodinidae. The genus was erected by Otto Staudinger in 1886. The species are found in the eastern Palearctic, mainly in the Himalayas.
Key Works Walter Forster