changing honorific epithets

[Gomez Luis Diego]

I do not know what the ICZN stipulates about endings in honorific
epithets but I know its is less strict that in the Botanical Code. The
endings are mostly ruled by concordance in Latin. In Botany, a name
wrongly spelled by its author can not be changed, e.g. the fungus
Naematoloma condolliana (original spelling, wrong( which some recent
mycologists cite as it would correctly be N. candolleana. The correction
of the spelling alone would not be an emmendation properly,emend. refers
only to the concept being described, for example genus xx Clinton emend.
Bush.

On Mon, 4 Dec 1995, Doug Yanega wrote:

> I have another nomenclatural query: when an author names a species with an
> honorific, must the ending follow a certain rule or face emendation? I ask,
> for example, in the case of the beetle _Oberea schaumii_ LeConte 1852.
> Casey came along in 1913 and spelled it _schaumi_, which is how it is
> presently listed. Similarly for _Liopus wiltii_ Horn 1880, which has just
> been renamed by Linsley & Chemsak as _Liopinus wilti_ (and they do not even
> specify the change to be an emendation, they just drop the second "i" and
> leave you guessing as to why). I thought emendation was only allowed when
> the original spelling was shown to be *in error*? In the above cases, are
> the changes of spelling valid and binding?
> Thanks,
>
> Doug Yanega       Illinois Natural History Survey, 607 E. Peabody Dr.
> Champaign, IL 61820 USA      phone (217) 244-6817, fax (217) 333-4949
>  affiliate, Univ. of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Dept. of Entomology
>   "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
>         is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82
>