Dessart thanks for Pieris

[Paul Dessart]

September 23, 1996

Dear Taxacomers,

My list of taxonomic names common to both vegetal and animal Reigns
raised a lot of reactions, most interesting or ... interested. Well, I'll try
to resume here my answers or comments in a unique message.

1. My list was established in two ways: first when, while reading
scientific literature I found a name in a Reign that I already knew in the
other Reign (as I'm a zoologist most interested by botany); second,
checking voluntarily the more classic genera of plants among NEAVE's
Nomenclator zoologicus, as they passed by my mind.
    This explains why my list is quite incomplete and never pretended
to be exhaustive; don't forget I sent on taxacom just the index of a
chapter on the matter, where this is broadly explained: I wrote a
particularly long list to prove that the cases where much more numerous
than the classic and sempiternal example Oenanthe was not an exception.
In that chapter, the families or higher groups are cited for each name.
So, dear Jenny Chappill, please send me you .snail-address/ (normal
mail!) and I'll send to you a printed copy of the whole chapter. I take
the opportunity to thank from heart those colleagues who kindly offered
me new doublets (Tribolium: Guerrit Davidse; Digitaria: JeF Veldkamp;
Aotus, Byblis, Culcita: Jenny Chappill. I must add that rather recently
I discovered another source in L. Agassiz 'Nomenclatori zoologici Index
universlis' (1846): but on the one hand, I had enough examples, on the
other hand, Agassiz not only gives true doublets but also names as
"Monima Huebner Lepidoptera / Monimia Thouars Monimiaceae" or
"Clivina Latreille Coleoptera / Clivia Lindl Amaryllidaceae" which are
not real doublets. But for colleagues who would be more complete than
me, this could be of help, at least for the very old names.

2.  The doublet "Hagenia J. F. Gmelin, 1791" and "Hagenia J. F.
Gmelin (1791)" discovered by the keen-eyed Magnus Liden is not
exactly a lapsus calami, rather a lapsus computeri. I use a word
processing allowing to mark word or words for an automatic alphabetical
index; having seen that I had forgotten the parentheses after Gmelin, I
added them in the text and marked again for the index the genus-author-
date; I just forgot to delete the wrong one. This is still a draft MS which
will require many re-readings and corrections. Such a keen observer as
Magnus Liden would be welcome...

3.  As the message was public, you already know that there is at least
one *binome* common to both Reigns, and, as to humiliate me,
precisely _Pieris japonica_... All my thanks to Mary E. Petersen and Jan
Haugum for this most interesting information, which will surely enjoy
Scott Federhen too! You must know that I'm specialized in the tiny
Ceraphronoidea (Microhymenoptera), that this MS is composed as a
recreative work and that I don't know nor can consult everything: the
butterfly did not appear in the catalogue I had at hand (or maybe as a
subspecies and this did not work!). Note, moreover, that in my MS text
I don't say there are no one, I wrote .up to now, I did not succeed in
finding one.../
4.  I also thank Gary Rosenberg for the correction in some botanical
authors' names. Actually, I have a long list of botanical genera without
author and/or date; I used to visit from time to time the National
Botanical Garden in Meise (the library of which is open... one day a
week...on appointment...) to consult the 'Index nominum genericorum';
but finally, I'm expecting to have .indexed/ all the names, (with an "*"
when incomplete) and check the "asterisked" ones at Meise all together,
with an index covering all the chapters (12 + bibliography).

5.  The same Gary Rosenberg suggested that the double name Ficus
(Moraceae/Mollusks) being very rich in species in both Reigns could
furnish one or some binomial doublets and kindly proposed to send me
a list of the mollusks species. This is most friendly; but as my work
don't pretend to be exhaustive, as I desperate to finish it before my
death, and as I have now Pieris japonica at hand, this unique example
will be demonstrative enough. Unless that some one wants to do the
work...

6.  I also thank John McNeill, who broadened my views mentioning
the same problem with the Bacteria, with triplets; I answer positively to
his question about his MS, considering that a great honor!

    Well, sorry for people uninterested by the problem, as well as for
my broken English, and many thanks again to everybody, hoping I did
not forget any concerned colleague.

Paul Dessart,
Chef honoraire de la Section Insectes et Arachnomorphes
a'  l'Institut royal des Sciences naturelles de Belgique.