Fig. 29 (after Sordelli)
Scales with a single apical pit, in seventeen rows. Ventral shields 150 to 191; anal divided; subcaudals 53 to 78.
Coloration.—Not unlike that of a young Zamenis gemonensis. Greyish-olive above, uniform or each scale lighter in the centre. The greater part of the upper surface of the head behind the snout, together with the nape, black in the young, with a yellow cross-bar or a pair of yellow spots between the eyes, the bar sometimes confluent with the yellow postoculars, and a horseshoe-shaped band of the same colour on the temples and across the occiput ([Plate X].); the black of the nape again edged with yellow behind. More or less distinct traces of these markings are preserved in adult specimens. Upper lip yellowish, with black spots or bars on the sutures between the shields. Lower parts uniform white or yellowish.
In the var. semimaculata, Boettger, from Chios, small dark spots are scattered over the upper parts of the anterior half of the body.
Size.—This snake rarely reaches a length of 19 inches. It is the smallest Colubrid of Europe.
Distribution.—The Caucasus up to about 5,000 feet, Asia Minor, Chios, Cyprus, Syria, Mesopotamia, and North-Western Persia. The northern slope of the Caucasus appears to be the only part of Europe included in its habitat. The British Museum possesses two specimens labelled as from Constantinople, but the presence of this species in European Turkey requires confirmation.
A closely allied species, which has been confounded with C. modesta, C. collaris (Ménétriès), and which also inhabits the Caucasus without having been recorded from the northern slope, is distinguished by having the scales in fifteen rows (very rarely seventeen), and the posterior chin-shields in contact with each other.
Habits.—Nothing is known as regards this species, but the North American members of the genus Contia are chiefly insectivorous and oviparous.
Genus CŒLOPELTIS, Wagler
Maxillary teeth small and subequal, followed after a short interspace by one or two very large grooved fangs situated below the posterior border of the eye; anterior mandibular teeth strongly enlarged. Head not very distinct from neck, with angular canthus rostralis and projecting supraocular; eye large, with round pupil; nostril a crescentic slit in a single or divided nasal. Body elongate; scales smooth, more or less distinctly grooved longitudinally in the adult, with apical pits. Tail moderately long.