Copies
of these Comments can be obtained free of charge from the
Executive Secretary, The International Commission on Zoological
Nomenclature, c/o The Natural History Museum, Cromwell
Road, London SW7 5BD, U.K. (e-mail:iczn@nhm.ac.uk).
Comment on the proposed precedence
of Buprestis angustula Illiger, 1803 (Insecta, Coleoptera)
over Buprestis pavida Fabricius, 1793
(Case
3388; see BZN 64: 178-181)
Ted C. MacRae
Monsanto Co. 700 Chesterfield Parkway
West, Chesterfield, Missouri, 63017, U.S.A. (e-mail: ted.c.macrae@monsanto.com)
I would like to comment on
Case 3388, ‘‘Buprestis
angustula Illiger, 1803 (Insecta, Coleoptera) . . .’’,
by E. Jendek (2007, BZN 64(3): 178–181). I support the
proposed precedence of the specific name over that of Buprestis
pavida whenever the two are considered synonyms. I agree with
the author that the interest of stability is best served by
maintaining precedence of this long-used name for a common,
widelydistributed species.
Comment on the proposed conservation
of usage of Archaeopteryx lithographica von Meyer, 1861 (Aves)
by designation of a neotype
(Case 3390; see BZN 64: 1–3)
Paul M. Barrett & Angela
C. Milner
Department of Palaeontology, Natural History Museum, Cromwell
Road, London SW7 5BD, U.K. (e-mail: p.barret@nhm.ac.uk
& a.milner@nhm.ac.uk)
We write in support of Bock & Bühler’s
proposal to set aside the holotype specimen of Archaeopteryx
lithographica von Meyer, 1861 and to conserve this name by
designation of a neotype specimen BMNH 37001 (the ‘London
specimen’), for the following reasons.
Firstly, the holotype
specimen is a single feather preserved in part and counterpart
(see Bühler & Bock, 2002). Although it could be argued
that this could have been sufficiently diagnostic to form the
basis for a new taxon at the time of description, as no other
birds were then known from Mesozoic deposits and therefore
the mere presence of feathers could have been used as a diagnostic
character, new discoveries have rendered any potentially diagnostic
features of this specimen obsolescent (sensu Wilson & Upchurch,
2003). These include the discoveries of spectacularly preserved
Mesozoic birds and non-avian dinosaurs with very similar feathers
from the Lower Cretaceous Jehol Biota of China (e.g. Chang
et al., 2003): as a result, the presence of feathers alone
can no longer be regarded as potentially diagnostic. Furthermore,
these finds demonstrate that isolated feathers are not sufficiently
distinct in terms of morphology to permit referral to any particular
Mesozoic bird taxon. As a result, it is possible that the holotype
specimen of Archaeopteryx lithographica may not be referable
to the same taxon as that represented by the skeletal specimens
usually referred to this species. This is particularly important
as some authorities contend that several bird species lived
alongside A. lithographica in the Solnhofen environment on
the basis of osteological evidence (e.g. Elzanowski, 2002).
Secondly, BMNH 37001 represents the first skeletal specimen
to be discovered (Owen, 1863), so in terms of ‘priority’ could
be regarded as the obvious choice of neotype specimen if the
holotype feather is set aside. This choice is corroborated
by von Meyer’s (1861) comment, noted by Elzanowski (2002),
on hearing of the discovery of the first skeletal specimen
that ‘Archaeopteryx
lithographica is a name I deem appropriate for the designation
of the animal’.
On this basis, Elzanowski (2002) recommended that the London
specimen should be recognised as the holotype.
Thirdly, BMNH 37001 has often been regarded as the type specimen
in the past (e.g. Elzanowski, 2002), albeit mistakenly (see
Bühler & Bock,
2002), so there is already precedence for nominating the London
specimen as the neotype.
Fourthly, BMHH 37001 has habitually been referred to as Archaeopteryx
lithographica in the literature (De Beer, 1954; Mayr et al.,
2007) and has no other valid names associated with it. This
is in contrast to some other specimens of Archaeopteryx, such
as the ‘Berlin specimen’ (MB 1880/1881), which
is currently designated as the type specimen of Archaeopteryx
siemensii Dames, 1897. Similarly, several other bird specimens
from Solnhofen (usually considered to be additional specimens
of Archaeopteryx) also bear potentially valid names, including
Archaeopteryx bavarica Wellnhofer, 1993, and Wellnhoferia grandis
Elzanowski, 2001. Selection of BMNH 37001 as the neotype would
therefore represent the simplest solution to issues of taxonomic
priority that would arise if the holotype specimen were set
aside.
In summary, setting aside the holotype feather in favour of
a neotype skeleton with associated feather impressions (BMNH
37001) would finally stabilise the taxonomy of this species
and would be entirely consistent with current and historical
usage of the binomen Archaeopteryx lithographica.
Additional references
Chang,
M.-M., Chen, P.-J., Wang, Y.-Q. & Wang, Y. (Eds.).
2003. The Jehol Biota: the emergence
of feathered dinosaurs, beaked birds and flowering plants. 208 pp. Shanghai Scientific
and Technical Publishers, Shanghai.
Dames, W. 1897. Über Brustbein, Schulter-
und Beckengürtel
der Archaeopteryx. Sitzungsberichte der Königlich
Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, 1897:
818–834.
De Beer, G. 1954. Archaeopteryx
lithographica. 68 pp. British
Museum (Natural History), London.
Elzanowski, A. 2001. A new genus and species
for the largest specimen of Archaeopteryx. Acta
Palaeontologica Polonica, 46: 519–532.
Elzanowski, A. 2002. Archaeopterygidae (Upper
Jurassic of Germany). Pp. 129–159 in Chiappe, L.M. & Witmer,
L.M. (Eds.), Mesozoic birds: above the
heads of dinosaurs. University of California Press, Berkeley.
Mayr, G, Pohl, B., Hartman, S. & Peters, D.S. 2007.
The tenth skeletal specimen of Archaeopteryx. Zoological
Journal of the Linnean Society, 149: 97–116.
Owen, R. 1863. On the Archaeopteryx of
von Meyer, with a description of the fossil remains of a long-tailed
species, from the lithographic limestone of Solenhofen. Philosophical
Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 153: 33–47.
Von Meyer, H. 1861. Archaeopteryx
lithographica (Vogel-Feder)
und Pterodactylus von Solnhofen. Neues
Jahrbuch für Mineralogie,
Geologie und Palaeontologie, 1861: 678–679.
Wellnhofer, P. 1993. Das siebte Exemplar von Archaeopteryx aus
den Solnhofener Schichten. Archaeopteryx, 11: 1–47.
Wilson, J.A. & Upchurch, P. 2003. A revision
of Titanosaurus Lydekker (Dinosauria—Sauropoda), the
first dinosaur genus with a ‘Gondwanan’ distributrion.
Journal of Systematic Palaeontology, 1: 125–160.
