Noctua or Denis & Schiffermüller, 1775: 87. Type-locality: Austria, Vienna district. Noctua ypsilon-graecum Goeze, 1781: 253. Type-locality: Europe.
Phalaena (Noctua) gamma-graecum Retzius, 1783: 47. Type-locality: Europe.
Noctua consobrina Borkhausen, 1790: 66, pl. 6: 4 b. Type-locality: Europe.
Noctua octogena Esper, 1791: 388, pl. 128: f 5. Type-locality: Europe.
Noctua gemina Beckwith, 1794: 4, pl. 1: 4–6. Type-locality: Europe.
Palimpsestis rufa Houlbert, 1921: 148. Type-locality: Europe. Lectotype ♂ (BMNH). Palimpsestis or hela Rangnow, 1935: 205, pl. 3: 27 a. Type-locality: Sweden, Lappland. Tethea or nigrescens Werny, 1966: 342, fig. 197. Type-locality: Germany, Saarbrücken. Holotype ♂ (CDS).
Remarks. The nominate subspecies is distributed from most part of Europe to Turkey, and represented in the continental part of East Asia by T. or terrosa (Graeser, 1888). Another subspecies, akanensis (Matsumura, 1933), is distributed in Japan.