Its peculiar appearance has turned it into an animal, fictional and cinematographic event.
Usually, insects are not the most beautiful beings in nature, and as proof we present you with nightmare photos captured with a mega telephoto lens. However, the butterflies they can be considered showy animals, depending on their shape, design and color. Currently, some of its species are in danger of extinction, but none have a nickname so scary.
Saurona triangula and Saurona aurigera, arrivals from Middle-earth
The Natural History Museum recently announced on its website the discovery of a new species of butterfly. At the moment, the new species has two specimens in its ranks and a nickname that would unleash the madness of meeting in Middle-earth. The butterfly that you can see under these lines has been named Saurona, specifically as triangular Saurona and Saurona aurigera.
😮🦋 Saurona is one of several new butterfly genera described by an international team of researchers. https://t.co/tXqhbNfEg3
— Excelsior (@Excelsior) May 9, 2023
It is clear that his appearance does not instill the same fear as the ‘bad bad guy’ from the novels created by the brilliant mind of JRR Tolkien, but his name will always remind us of who controls the one ring. This new species of butterfly has been nicknamed Saurona because in its wings you can see a series of rings. Their hind wings they have a orange tone and its dark specks they give it an aspect that Dr. Blanca Huertas, a museum specialist in these insects, has described in a study published in the scientific journal Systematic Entomology.
And it is that this it’s not the first time that a fictional character is the involuntary protagonist of the name of a recently discovered species, not even that a character from ‘Lord of the Rings’ has left the pages of books to end up being immortalized in a real animalas stated on the website of the London History Museum:
These are a few of the species that have been named after JRR Tolkien and his work. The wizard Gandalf, for example, is present in a group of mammalian fossils, and species of crabs, moths, and beetles are named after him, while Gollum names snails, wasps, and a fish.