| Higher Taxa | Gekkonidae, Gekkota, Sauria, Squamata (lizards: geckos) | 
        | Subspecies |  | 
        | Common Names | E: Ornate Day Gecko, Ornate Dwarf Gecko | 
        | Synonym | Gymnodactylus ornatus BEDDOME 1870: 32 Gonatodes ornatus — BOULENGER 1885: 66
 Gonatodes ornatus — ANNANDALE 1909: 253
 Cnemaspis ornata – SMITH 1935: 70
 Cnemaspis ornata – WERMUTH 1965: 15
 Cnemaspis ornata — KLUGE 1993
 Cnemaspis (Cnemaspis) ornata — RÖSLER 2000: 63
 Cnemaspis ornata — MURTHY 2010: 92
 | 
        | Distribution | S India (Tinnevelly and Anaimalai Hills, Malabar, Travancore, Kerala, Tamil Nadu). 
 Type locality: South Tinnevelly Hills.
 | 
        | Reproduction | oviparous | 
        | Types | Lectotype: BMNH 74.4.29.400, male, (designated by MANAMENDRA-ARACHCHI et al. 2007). 42.0 mm SVL, “South Tinnevelly Hills” (Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu State, India). | 
        | Diagnosis | Diagnosis: Cnemaspis ornata differs from its peninsular Indian and Sri Lankan congeners by a combination of the following characters. Maximum SVL 42.0 mm; paired postmentals widely separated by a medial scale; each postmental bounded by 3 or 4 scales including medial scale; ventrals, 161; dorsal scales heterogeneous with enlarged tubercles; spine-like tubercles absent on flank; ventrals smooth, subimbricate; 6–8 preanal pores; no femoral pores; subcaudals smooth, median series with individual large, divided scales alternating with pairs of smaller undivided ones; supralabials to angle of jaws, 7–9; subdigital lamellae on digit IV of pes, 30 [from MANAMENDRA-ARACHCHI et al. 2007]. | 
        | Comment |  | 
        | Etymology | The Latin ornata, -us, "decoration" or "ornament," refers to the ornate coloration. | 
        | References | 
            Annandale, N. 1909. Report on a small collection of lizards from Travancore. Records of the Indian Museum 3: 253-257  - get paper hereBeddome, R.H. 1870. Descriptions of some new lizards from the Madras Presidency. Madras Monthly J. Med. Sci. 1: 30-35 Bhupathy, Subramanian & N. Sathishkumar 2013. Status of reptiles in Meghamalai and its environs, Western Ghats, Tamil Nadu, India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 5 (15): 4953-4961  - get paper hereBoulenger, G.A. 1885. Catalogue of the lizards in the British Museum (Nat. Hist.) I. Geckonidae, Eublepharidae, Uroplatidae, Pygopodidae, Agamidae. London: 450 pp.  - get paper hereConstable, JOHN D. 1949. Reptiles from the Indian Peninsula in the Museum of Comparative Zoology. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool. Harvard 103: 59-160.  - get paper hereInger R F; Marx H; Koshy M 1984. An undescribed species of gekkonid lizard (Cnemaspis) from India with comments on the status of C. tropidogaster. Herpetologica 40 (2): 149-154  - get paper hereInger, Robert F.;Shaffer, H. Bradley;Koshy, Mammen;Bakde, Ramesh 1984. A report on a collection of amphibians and reptiles from the Ponmudi, Kerala, South India. J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 81 (3): 551-570  - get paper hereManamendra-Arachchi, Kelum; Batuwita, Sudesh & Pethiyagoda, Rohan 2007. A taxonomic revision of the Sri Lankan day-geckos (Reptilia: Gekkonidae: Cnemaspis), with description of new species from Sri Lanka and southern India. Zeylanica 7 (1): 9-122 Murthy, T.S.N. 2010. The reptile fauna of India. B.R. Publishing, New Delhi, 332 pp. Palot, M.J. 2015. A checklist of reptiles of Kerala, India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 7(13): 8010–8022  - get paper hereRösler, H. 2000. Kommentierte Liste der rezent, subrezent und fossil bekannten Geckotaxa (Reptilia: Gekkonomorpha). Gekkota 2: 28-153 SAYYED, AMIT; L. LEE GRISMER, PATRICK D CAMPBELL, RAVEENDRAN DILEEPKUMAR 2019. Description of a cryptic new species of Cnemaspis Strauch, 1887 (Squamata: Gekkonidae) from the Western Ghats of Kerala State of India. Zootaxa 4656 (3): 501–514  - get paper hereSmith, M.A. 1935. The fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma. Reptiles and Amphibia, Vol. II. Sauria. Taylor and Francis, London, 440 pp. Venugopal, P.D. 2010. An updated and annotated list of Indian lizards (Reptilia: Sauria) based on a review of distribution records and checklists of Indian reptiles. Journal of Threatened Taxa 2 (3): 725-738.  - get paper hereWermuth, H. 1965. Liste der rezenten Amphibien und Reptilien. Gekkonidae, Pygopodidae, Xantusiidae. Das Tierreich (80): 1—246  | 
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