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Specimen No. 39: Sovereign Pyra Monarch
Specimen No. 39
Name: Sovereign Pyra | Danaus regalis pyraarchon
Discovered by: Dr. Clémentine Bourdier
Date of Discovery: 9 November 1911
Locality: Northern edge of Lake Como, between Villa Pliniana and Torno, Lombardy, Italy (elevation: 208 m)
Catalog No. FD - 21 - 39
The butterfly was first recorded not in a forest nor a field, but on the abandoned second-floor balcony of a shuttered villa above Lake Como.
Dr. Clémentine Bourdier had been granted seasonal access to Villa Pliniana’s botanic terraces—then overgrown, unswept, and veined with stone pathways gone green at the edges. She was studying regrowth in fire-cleared hedges—laurel, broom, and myrtle—after a brushfire had spread up the lakeside two years earlier. What remained was lush, but strange. Moss grew in places it hadn’t before. Ferns had returned too early. The soil still smelled faintly like salt.
And then there was the butterfly.
It arrived mid-morning, when the lake light ricocheted off the stucco walls like a mirror turned slightly. Its wings were half-open, unmoving. She at first mistook it for painted tile.
Bourdier named it Sovereign Pyra after an evening spent watching it from across a courtyard. She was seated in what had once been a ballroom, the windows blown out long ago. The butterfly had perched atop a marble bust, unmoved for over an hour.
Structurally, chromatically, genetically, it is Danaus plexippus—but this is the Lake Como monarch, now formally identified as a regional subspecies. It is sedentary, hyperlocal, and likely a relict population descended from migratory monarchs that became isolated by geography and climate in the 19th century.
It is smaller, more saturated, and more sedentary. It does not follow wind corridors. It does not cross oceans. It appears quietly in the neglected, sun-warmed corners of Italian gardens — places once touched by heat, decay, or silence.
Excerpt from Dr. Bourdier’s notebook:
“It mates once per season. Eggs are laid on fire-regrowth milkweed (Asclepias italica) growing along old wall crevices, volcanic runoffs, and burnt olive terraces. Larvae are dark-striped with ochre-gold nodes along the dorsal ridge — brighter than typical caterpillars of the species.
The forewings are deep flame-orange, with slightly thickened black margins. The typical white apical spots appear muted and smoke-toned, as if viewed through aged glass. Hindwings retain the classic monarch shape but are darker—rounded, deep ochre with plum-colored shading at the margins, and veined like oxidized copper.
The underside is pale orange, with muted charcoal veining. Uniquely, the undersides display a greenish patination, thought to be an adaptation to Mediterranean stone environments.
Danaus regalis pyraarchon does not follow seasonal emergence. Instead, its pupation appears to be linked to soil temperature fluctuations along geothermal seams, particularly near Lake Como’s lesser-known mineral springs. The butterfly has never been seen more than 300 meters from those sites.”
Bourdier’s specimen, preserved in a single white frame, still resides in the botanical wing of the Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano. The wing tips are slightly frayed, as if the creature had once passed through smoke to get there.
Danaus regalis pyraarchon has only been recorded five times in the past century, always within a narrow band of villas between Bellagio and Lezzeno. It appears only after high heat, usually following a dry autumn and a brief fire season.
Note: High quality archival glicée print on acid-free paper, a method that creates fine art reproductions with exceptional color accuracy and longevity. Pigments-based inks are designed to resist fading and discoloration and capture the finest details and subtle color variations with great precision.
Housed in a 4×6” crystal-clear acrylic specimen block, its 1” depth allows freestanding display. Each piece is designed to exhibit on desk or shelf.
Fly Design uses a practice known as entonology — the study of fictitious insects — to reimagine the natural world through scientific storytelling and poetic design.
Specimen No. 39
Name: Sovereign Pyra | Danaus regalis pyraarchon
Discovered by: Dr. Clémentine Bourdier
Date of Discovery: 9 November 1911
Locality: Northern edge of Lake Como, between Villa Pliniana and Torno, Lombardy, Italy (elevation: 208 m)
Catalog No. FD - 21 - 39
The butterfly was first recorded not in a forest nor a field, but on the abandoned second-floor balcony of a shuttered villa above Lake Como.
Dr. Clémentine Bourdier had been granted seasonal access to Villa Pliniana’s botanic terraces—then overgrown, unswept, and veined with stone pathways gone green at the edges. She was studying regrowth in fire-cleared hedges—laurel, broom, and myrtle—after a brushfire had spread up the lakeside two years earlier. What remained was lush, but strange. Moss grew in places it hadn’t before. Ferns had returned too early. The soil still smelled faintly like salt.
And then there was the butterfly.
It arrived mid-morning, when the lake light ricocheted off the stucco walls like a mirror turned slightly. Its wings were half-open, unmoving. She at first mistook it for painted tile.
Bourdier named it Sovereign Pyra after an evening spent watching it from across a courtyard. She was seated in what had once been a ballroom, the windows blown out long ago. The butterfly had perched atop a marble bust, unmoved for over an hour.
Structurally, chromatically, genetically, it is Danaus plexippus—but this is the Lake Como monarch, now formally identified as a regional subspecies. It is sedentary, hyperlocal, and likely a relict population descended from migratory monarchs that became isolated by geography and climate in the 19th century.
It is smaller, more saturated, and more sedentary. It does not follow wind corridors. It does not cross oceans. It appears quietly in the neglected, sun-warmed corners of Italian gardens — places once touched by heat, decay, or silence.
Excerpt from Dr. Bourdier’s notebook:
“It mates once per season. Eggs are laid on fire-regrowth milkweed (Asclepias italica) growing along old wall crevices, volcanic runoffs, and burnt olive terraces. Larvae are dark-striped with ochre-gold nodes along the dorsal ridge — brighter than typical caterpillars of the species.
The forewings are deep flame-orange, with slightly thickened black margins. The typical white apical spots appear muted and smoke-toned, as if viewed through aged glass. Hindwings retain the classic monarch shape but are darker—rounded, deep ochre with plum-colored shading at the margins, and veined like oxidized copper.
The underside is pale orange, with muted charcoal veining. Uniquely, the undersides display a greenish patination, thought to be an adaptation to Mediterranean stone environments.
Danaus regalis pyraarchon does not follow seasonal emergence. Instead, its pupation appears to be linked to soil temperature fluctuations along geothermal seams, particularly near Lake Como’s lesser-known mineral springs. The butterfly has never been seen more than 300 meters from those sites.”
Bourdier’s specimen, preserved in a single white frame, still resides in the botanical wing of the Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano. The wing tips are slightly frayed, as if the creature had once passed through smoke to get there.
Danaus regalis pyraarchon has only been recorded five times in the past century, always within a narrow band of villas between Bellagio and Lezzeno. It appears only after high heat, usually following a dry autumn and a brief fire season.
Note: High quality archival glicée print on acid-free paper, a method that creates fine art reproductions with exceptional color accuracy and longevity. Pigments-based inks are designed to resist fading and discoloration and capture the finest details and subtle color variations with great precision.
Housed in a 4×6” crystal-clear acrylic specimen block, its 1” depth allows freestanding display. Each piece is designed to exhibit on desk or shelf.
Fly Design uses a practice known as entonology — the study of fictitious insects — to reimagine the natural world through scientific storytelling and poetic design.