[Taxacom] formation of zoological names with Mc, Mac, etc.

[Francisco Welter-Schultes]

Paul,
> so do zoologists translate and transcribe when authors names are not
> cited in the original publication in the Latin alphabet? 
There are no approved standards, this varies currently among 
disciplines and authors. It seems to be accepted that names of 
authors should be cited in Latin script. But the ICZN 
Code does not rule that, officially you can also use Chinese script 
for the name of the author.

I tend to follow commissioner Nina Bogutskaya from Russia for a best 
practice guide (ZooBank is a US American venture and they do not know 
much about languages and scripts, and have no opinion), she has 
proposed to transcribe the name following a standard transcription 
mode if no transcription is given in the original work. But not for 
authors from Latin-script countries who published in non-Latin script 
journals and got their names transcribed in that script, which 
if being re-transcribed would differ from their original Latin script 
name.
Lindholm published in a Russian journal, the name was spelled in 
Russian script, standard re-transciption would give Lindgol'm, 
Bogutskaya proposed not to use this spelling, but Lindholm. 

Standard transcription mode should also be used for Russian 
authors with names of German or other Latin-script origin, otherwise 
we would need to start debating how many generations are needed for a 
name to become a Russian native.

Chinese authors are still an open issue. It seems that Pinyin 
transcription should not automatically be used for Taiwanese authors.

> Are the
> authors names, unicode character by unicode character, accurately
> recorded in you database?
Yes they are. UTF-8 is today regarded as an international standard.

Francisco

University of Goettingen, Germany
www.animalbase.org