Dear Stephanie,

Welcome back to the list-serve!  Through your research we know that the
date of publication of Murex sauliae (or saulii) was 1841 and that the name
Fusinus anni must be emended to F. annae.  It is a fact that Lovell Reeve
and George Brettingham Sowerby II were close collaborators more most of
their respective lives.  Sowerby illustrated Reeve's Conchologia Iconica.
I strongly suspect that if there was an intention on the part of Sowerby to
honor a male relative of Miss Saul, Reeve would have been one of the first
to know.

Harry


At 03:33 PM 1/31/00 -0800, you wrote:
>To Harry et al
>>
>>Although G. B. Sowerby II didn't exactly state he was naming Murex Saulii
>[sic]
>>after Miss Jane Saul, it is quite obvious that he knew of a specimen(s) of
>this
>
>From the what he said in the paper there is in theory at least three
>specimens that should make up the syntype series which were originally in
>the following collections One in Saul's collection, one in Stainforth's
>collection and one in Reeve's collection.
>
>>new taxon in her (then already famous; now at Cambridge, UK) collection.
>>Placing myself in a contemporary readership and considering the author's
>renown
>>as a "shocking latinist,"  I would argue that Reeve's emendation of the
>>specific name to "Sauliae" was "justified" (ICZN-speak for kosher), but it a
>>isn't an "air-tight case" (and G. B. S.'s linguistic deficiencies might be
>>deemed "irrelevant" to the nomenclatorial argument in an ICZN proceeding).
>
>This may be true but unless Reeve asked Sowerby if that is what he intended
>and has indicated as such - even Reeve is only making an assumption. It
>could be just as easily possible that Miss Saul asked GB. Sowerby to name
>the shell after some relative etc as well (the obvious assumption is not
>always the correct one) so if we assume L. Reeve had some idea of what was
>going on or there is some note on the actual specimen (if it still exists)
>then we could accept this but otherwise we have to leave it as is.
>Regardless of how bad Sowerby was considered to be with latin.
>
>>I presume the actual date of publication of the original description of Murex
>>Saulii [sic] in Proc. Zool. Soc. London was 1841; or was it 1840?
>
>The date of publication was 1841, the volume of the Proc Zool Soc Lond is
>1840. The meeting at which the paper was read was either Oct or Nov 1840 -
>I don't have the intervening pages. And the paper directly proceeding this
>one was by his father and named two Philippine land snails including Helix
>annulata (Helicostyla annulata).
>
>I enjoy a lot going back to the original literature and things like the
>above are the reasons I have made special efforts to find and see the
>original descriptions especially of Australian species I am working with.
>For example by doing this I have in the last 18 months or so corrected
>several errors including the following two taxonomic errors.  One was an
>extremely rare one by Tom Iredale for the correct author of a small
>estuarine nerite which had been in the museum collection files etc since
>1938 and the other was one of the 72 species of freshwater snails am
>currently writing up which was described in 1863 by Fraunfeld but for the
>last century or so it was thought he named it in 1865 instead.
>
>>Did Snyder (1986) actually say he named Latirus anni for his wife?  Can you
>>provide the reference?
>
>The full reference is
>Snyder,MA., 1986. Fusinus anni (Gastropoda: Fasciolariidae), a new species
>from southeastern Australia. Journal of the Malacological Society of
>Australia. 7(3-4):125-129.
>
>on page 128 it says - This species is named for my wife, a good friend and
>a helpful critic.
>
>It is interesting to note that Winston Ponder of the Australian Museum had
>intended once to revise the Fusinus group (but alsa this will not happen)
>and had intended to name the above species after his own wife Julie - but
>when Martin indicated that he thought the species was new to Winston -
>Winston helped him out with some extra notes etc.
>
>Stephanie
>
>
>
>******************************************************************************
>Stephanie A. Clark
>
>Invertebrate Identification
>Unit 4/17 Morris Street
>PO Box 418
>Summer Hill, NSW 2130
>Australia
>
>phone  61 (02) 9799 5689  fax  61 (02) 9799 5610  mobile  0412 372388
>email [log in to unmask]

Harry G. Lee
Suite 500
1801 Barrs St.
Jacksonville, FL 32204
USA   904-384-6419
<[log in to unmask]>
Visit the Jacksonville Shell Club Home Page at:
http://home.sprynet.com/~wfrank/jacksonv.htm

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