Krausse (1910) is a paper on stridulation and gives no
taxonomic information; his subsequent (1911) description is at  .
Santschi (1927c: 24) keyed it out as having the first segment of the
gaster quite hairy (pileux), from Italy, Sardinia, Corsica & Crete.
His short text description (p 6) is - "head and gaster brownish-black
or black; alitrunk more or less dark red with the upper pronotum and
mesonotum brown; ; basal segment of the gaster weakly pilous with
several elongated "points"; slightly smaller than the type (semirufus),
the rest similar.
Casevitz-Weulersse (1990a) relates searching the
National Museum in Paris and finding the specimens separated by
Santschi for M. meridionalis and M. meridionalis wasmanni,
the latter being from Corsica. Having also sighted specimens from
Greece that matched the Corsican wasmanni, she judged the form
to be a readily separable distinct species. In her key the closest
species is the much smaller M. minor, TL 4.3-6 mm.
From that key the description of wasmanni now
stands as -
"[couplet 1'] Underside of head with several long hairs, inclined
anteriorly and weahly curved apically; translucent erect hairs on the
whole body. [couplet 3'] Head and gaster of a marked brilliant black;
alitrunk ferruginous red with large black patches; pedicel segments
black above and ferruginous red below; ; some weak striations on the
frons; several erect hairs on the gaster, scarce on the whole body; TL
maximum 9.5 mm.
The specimens shown below and on the attached page
appear to match the overall descriptions. The psammophore hairs are
more pronounced in the media specimens than in the major; this also has
a dark red rather than black head and more pronounced erect pilosity.
Note: Collingwood & Agosti (1996: 322) wrote "Specimens labelled M. concolor cotype in the Oxford University Museum of Natural History (Hope Museum) and NHMB are confirmed as M. wasmanni. M. concolor being a junior synonym". What this means is unclear as M. concolor was described by Emery in 1908, i.e. predating M. wasmanni. M. concolor was raised to species by Thomé & Thomé (1981b: 143). I am happy to regard them as separate species - see my Messor concolor page.
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The
polymorphism photomontage is of specimens collected in Italy,
at 10 km east of Brindisi, 40°38'28" N 17°50'28" E, elev 34 m;
14.ix.1999, by David King. The individual photomontages are on the
linked