Araneus extensively. The short documentary "Epeira diadema" (1952) by Italian director Alberto Ancilotto was nominated for an Oscar in 1953. It is about the spider today known as "Araneus diadematus". "Araneus" spiders possess various venoms, but will deliver a dry bite on 8 of 10 occasions. Females bite more often than males, who would rather flee or feign death. Araneus Araneus is a genus of common orb-weaving spiders. It includes about 650 species, among which are the European garden spider and the barn spider. Spiders of this genus present perhaps the most obvious case of sexual dimorphism among all of the
Araneus Theridiosomatidae ("Theridiosoma gemmosum", described by L. Koch, 1877 as "Theridion gemmosum"), Titanoecidae ("Nurscia albomaculata", described by Lucas, 1846 as "Epeira albo-maculata") and Uloboridae ("Uloborus glomosus", described by Walckenaer, 1842 as "Epeira glomosus"). "Epeira cylindrica" was at a time placed in Linyphiidae and is considered "incertae sedis", as is ""Araneus" cylindriformis" . "Epeira" was synonymized with the genus "Aranea" by Leach, 1815, and with "Araneus" by Simon, 1904. Throughout the 19th century, "Epeira" was used as a catch-all genus, similar to the once ubiquitous salticid genus "Attus". However, from 1911, to its last mention in 1957, only very few authors continued