Charaxes tiridates, the common blue charaxes, is a butterfly in the family Nymphalidae. It is found in Senegal, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Gabon, the Republic of the Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Kenya, Tanzania, Angola and Zambia. The habitat consists of lowland evergreen forests and dense savanna.
Image: Charaxestiridates
Image: Charaxestiridates Uns
Savanna forest mosaic in Ghana
Original illustration in Pieter Cramer and Caspar Stoll's Uitlandsche Kapellen, male
The rajah and pasha butterflies, also known as emperors in Africa and Australia, make up the huge type genus of the brush-footed butterfly subfamily Charaxinae, or leafwing butterflies. They belong to the tribe Charaxini, which also includes the nawab butterflies (Polyura). Charaxes are tropical Old World butterflies, with by far the highest diversity in sub-Saharan Africa, a smaller number from South Asia to Melanesia and Australia, and a single species in Europe. They are generally strong flyers and very popular among butterfly collectors.
Charaxes
Photograph from Schultze, 1917 Die Charaxiden und Apaturiden der Kolonie Kamerun, illustrating aspects of Charaxes biology
egg of C. solon
larva of C. jasius
