A survey of the spider genus Dysdera Latreille, 1804 (Araneae, Dysderidae) in Iran, with fourteen new species and notes on two fossil genera.

The taxonomy of the Iranian species of the dysderid spider genus Dysdera Latreille, 1804 is revised. Currently, the only species of this genus known from Iran is D.pococki Dunin, 1985, albeit on the basis of a doubtful record. The following 14 species are described as new to science in this paper: D.achaemenes sp. nov. (♀; Fars), D.bakhtiari sp. nov. (♂; Chaharmahal & Bakhtiari), D.damavandica sp. nov. (♂; Mazandaran), D.genoensis sp. nov. (♂♀; Hormozgan), D.hormuzensis sp. nov. (♀; Hormozgan), D.iranica sp. nov. (♂♀; Fars, Hormozgan), D.isfahanica sp. nov. (♂♀; Isfahan), D.mazeruni sp. nov. (♀; Mazandaran), D.medes sp. nov. (♂; Tehran), D.persica sp. nov. (♂♀; Golestan, Mazandaran), D.sagartia sp. nov. (♂♀; Tehran), D.tapuria sp. nov. (♂♀; Mazandaran), D.verkana sp. nov. (♂; Golestan), and D.xerxesi sp. nov. (♂; Bushehr). Distribution records of all species are mapped. Also, the taxonomy of Mistura Petrunkevitch, 1971 and Segistriites Straus, 1967, two fossil genera currently considered in Dysderidae, is discussed and the latter is transferred to Segestriidae.