Blapsium

{{Short description|Extinct genus of beetles}}

{{Speciesbox

| image = Blapsium egertoni.jpg

| image_caption = John O. Westwood's figure of Blapsium egertoni

| fossil_range = Middle Jurassic, {{fossil_range|Bathonian}}

| genus = Blapsium

| parent_authority = Westwood, 1854

| species = egertoni

| authority = Westwood, 1854

| synonyms =

• Blapsidium Phillips, 1871

}}

Blapsium is an extinct genus of beetles from the Middle Jurassic of England.{{cite journal|first=A. G.|last=Ponomarenko|year=2006|title=On the Types of Mesozoic Archostematan Beetles (Insecta, Coleoptera, Archostemata) in the Natural History Museum, London|journal=Paleontological Journal|volume=40|issue=1|pages=90–99|doi=10.1134/S0031030106010102}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LnihPwAACAAJ&q=smithsonian+handbooks+fossils|title=Fossils|last1=Walker|first1=Cyril Alexander|last2=Ward|first2=David|date=2002-01-01|publisher=DK|isbn=9780789489845|pages=78|language=en}} The only described species is B. egertoni,{{cite journal|first=J. O.|last=Westwood|year=1854|url=https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/35013337|title=Contributions to fossil entomology|journal=Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London|volume=10|pages=378–396}} which is known from a single specimen found by the Earl of Enniskillen at the Taynton Limestone Formation, also known as the Stonesfield Slate.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ACtHAQAAIAAJ&pg=RA7-PA191|title=United States Congressional Serial Set|date=1892-01-01|publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office|language=en}} The specimen is deposited in the Natural History Museum, London. It is incompletely preserved, lacking a head, pronotum and legs. It has a broad, convex body. It has a very short metathorax, which suggests that it was possibly apterous.

In his original description of the genus, John O. Westwood compared Blapsium to the darkling beetles and ground beetles. Ponomarenko (2006) redescribed the holotype of B. egertoni and referred it to the tribe Notocupedini in the family Ommatidae (considered in the paper to be a subfamily of Cupedidae), which was followed by Kirejtshuk (2020).{{Cite journal|last=Kirejtshuk|first=Alexander G.|date=2020-02-17|title=Taxonomic Review of Fossil Coleopterous Families (Insecta, Coleoptera). Suborder Archostemata: Superfamilies Coleopseoidea and Cupedoidea|journal=Geosciences|volume=10|issue=2|pages=73|doi=10.3390/geosciences10020073|bibcode=2020Geosc..10...73K|issn=2076-3263|doi-access=free}}