116 Propositions for rendering the Nomenclature of 



quently lost. Two things are necessary before a zoological term can acquire 

 any authority, viz. definition and publication. Definition properly implies a 

 distinct exposition of essential characters, and in all cases we conceive this to 

 be indispensable, although some authors maintain that a mere enumeration of 

 the component species, or even of a single type, is sufficient to authenticate 

 a genus. To constitute publication, nothing short of the insertion of the 

 above particulars in a printed book can be held sufficient. Many birds, for 

 instance, in the Paris and other continental museums, shells in the British 

 Museum (in Dr. Leach's time), and fossils in the Scarborough and other 

 public collections, have received MS. names which.will be of no authority until 

 they are published *. Nor can any unpublished descriptions, however exact 

 (such as those of Forster, which are still shut up in a MS. at Berlin), claim 

 any right of priority till published, and then only from the date of their pub- 

 lication. The same rule applies to cases where groups or species are pub- 

 lished, but not defined, as in some museum catalogues, and in Lesson's ' Traite 

 d'Ornithologie,' where many species are enumerated by name, without any 

 description or reference by which they can be identified. Therefore 



§ 12. A name which has never been clearly defined in some pub- 

 lished work should be changed for the earliest name by which the 

 object shall have been so defined. 



[Specific names, when adopted as generic, must be changed.^ 



The necessity for the following rule will be best illustrated by an example. 

 The Corvus pyrrhocorax, Linn., was afterwards advanced to a genus under 

 the name of Pyrrhocorax. Temminck adopts this generic name, and also 

 retains the old specific one, so that he terms the species Pyrrhocorax pyr- 

 rhocorax. The inelegance of this method is so great as to demand a change 

 of the specific name, and the species now stands as Pyrrhocorax alpinus, 

 Vieill. We propose therefore that 



§ 13. Anew specific name must be given to a species when its old 

 name has been adopted for a genus which includes that species. 



N.B. It will be seen, however, below, that we strongly object to the 

 further continuance of this practice of elevating specific names into generic. 



[Latin orthography to be adhered to.~\ 



On the subject of orthography it is necessary to lay down one proposition, — 

 § 14. In writing zoological names the rules of Latin orthography 

 must be adhered to. 



In Latinizing Greek words there are certain rules of orthography known 

 to classical scholars which must never be departed from. For instance, the 

 names which modern authors have written Aipunemia, Zenophasia, poioce- 

 phala, must, according to the laws of etymology, be spelt JEpycnemia, Xeno- 

 phasia and posocephala. In Latinizing modern words the rules of classic 

 usage do not apply, and all that we can do is to give to such terms as clas- 

 sical an appearance as we can, consistently with the preservation of their 

 etymology. In the case of European words whose orthography is fixed, it is 

 best to retain the original form, even though it may include letters and com- 

 binations unknown in Latin. Such words, for instance, as Woodwardi, 



* These MS. names are in all cases liable to create confusion, and it is therefore much to 

 be desired that the practice of using them should he avoided in future. 



