A survey of the spider family Nesticidae (Arachnida, Araneae) in Asia and Madagascar, with the description of forty-three new species.

Forty-three new species of Nesticidae are described from China, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and Madagascar, and two new junior synonyms are suggested. A new genus, Speleoticusgen. n., is described with Nesticus navicellatus Liu & Li, 2013 as the type species, and four species are transferfed from Nesticus, i.e., Speleoticus globosus (Liu & Li, 2013), comb. n., Speleoticus libo (Chen & Zhu, 2005), comb. n., Speleoticus navicellatus (Liu & Li, 2015), comb. n. and Speleoticus uenoi (Yaginuma, 1972), comb. n. The new species described in this paper belong to four genera and are: Hamus cornutussp. n. (♂♀), Hamus kangdingensissp. n. (♂), Hamus luzonsp. n. (♀), Hamus mangunensissp. n. (♂), Nescina kohisp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella baiseensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella baobabsp. n. (♂), Nesticella caecasp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella chongqingsp. n. (♀), Nesticella dazhuangensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella fuliangensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella gazuidasp. n. (♀), Nesticella gongshanensissp. n. (♀), Nesticella griswoldisp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella hongheensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella huomachongensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella jingposp. n. (♀), Nesticella kaohsiungensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella lisusp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella liuzhaiensissp. n. (♀), Nesticella nandanensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella phamisp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella potalasp. n. (♀), Nesticella qiaoqiensissp. n. (♀), Nesticella qiongensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella robustasp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella rongtangensissp. n. (♂), Nesticella sanchaheensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella sulawesisp. n. (♀), Nesticella sumatranasp. n. (♂), Nesticella tibetanasp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella vanlangsp. n. (♀), Nesticella wanzaiensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella xiongmaosp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella xixiasp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella yanbeiensissp. n. (♂♀), Nesticella yaosp. n. (♀), Nesticella zhiyuanisp. n. (♂♀), Pseudonesticus dafangensissp. n. (♂♀), Pseudonesticus miaosp. n. (♂♀), Pseudonesticus spinosussp. n. (♂♀), Pseudonesticus wumengensissp. n. (♀), Pseudonesticus ziyunensissp. n. (♂♀). Nesticella inthanoni (Lehtinen & Saaristo, 1980), syn. n. is synonymised with Nesticella mollicula (Thorell, 1898); Nesticella taiwan Tso & Yoshida, 2000, syn. n. is synonymised with Nesticella odonta (Chen, 1984). The female of Nesticella connectens Wunderlich, 1995, so far unknown, is described and recorded from Thailand. Nesticidae are reported from Madagascar for the first time. Nesticella nepalensis (Hubert, 1973) is recorded for the first time from China. Types of Nesticella odonta (Chen, 1984), Nesticella songi Chen & Zhu, 2004 and Nesticella yui Wunderlich & Song, 1995 are re-examined and photographed. The entire genus Nesticella is reviewed, and four species groups are recognised. DNA barcodes of the new species are obtained to confirm their correct identifications.