Vol. 34, pp. 77-80 March 31, 1921 



PROCEEDINGS 



OF THK 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



GENERAL NOTES. 



THE NAMES FOR TWO GENERA OF AFRICAN ARTIODACTYLA. 



The generic name Koiropotamus Gray, 1843 (List Spec. Mamm. Brit. 

 Mus., p. xxvii), is usually cited as anomen nudum, but proves on examination 

 to be a valid name. Although printed in one place in the body of the text as 

 " Choir opotamiis," it appears in the "Systematic List" in the front of the 

 book and in the index as Koiropotamus only, and was evidently taken direct 

 from the specific name koiropotamus of Desmoulins. As C koiropotamus, in the 

 body of the text (p. 185), it has been accepted as a valid name, but has been 

 considered as preoccupied by Chaeropotamus,' ' Cuvier, 1821, " which name in 

 reality first dates as a technical name for a fossil pig, not from Cuvier, but 

 from Desmarest, 1822 (Mammalogie, vol. 2, suppl., p. 544). In 1854, when 

 he proposed the substitute name Potamochcerus, Gray cited in synonymy 

 from his 1843 work the name Koiropotamus only, and took Choiropotamus 

 Gray from the Annals and Magazine of Natural History for October, 1852. 

 It seems clear that Choiropotamus Gray, 1843, is a lapsus for Koiropotamus 

 in the same work; that no error of transcription, lapsus calami, nor typo- 

 graphical error is evident in the case of Koiropotamus, since it was taken 

 direct from the specific name koiropotamus of Desmoulins; and that the 

 generic name Koiropotamus Gray is not invalidated by the earlier Chaero- 

 potamus of Desmarest. The bush pigs would rightly be known, then, by 

 the generic name Koiropotam,us Gray (type Sus africanus Schreber, not 

 Gmelin, =»Sus koiropotamus Desmoulins). 



Another genus of African ungulates that through error lost the name first 

 proposed for it is that currently known as Bubalis. It was first named 

 Alcelaphus by BlainvUle in 1816 (Bull. Soc. Philom., p. 75), type A. busela- 

 phus. Later names, all with the same type species, are Bubalis Goldfuss, 

 1820 (Handb. Zool., vol. 2, p. 367); Damalis Hamilton Smith, 1827 (Griff- 

 ith's Cuvier, vol. 4, p. 343); Acronotus Hamilton Smith, 1827 (1. c, p. 346); 

 and Bubalus Ogilby, 1837 (Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1836, p. 139; not of 

 Smith, 1827). The name recently used for the genus, "Bubalis Lichten- 

 stein, 1814," is not a valid generic name (see Lyon, Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash- 

 ington, vol. 27, p. 228, 1914). With the suppression of Bubalis Lichten- 

 stein, it follows that the generic name for the hartebeests, instead of becom- 

 ing Bubalis Goldfuss, should revert to the time honored Alcelaphus of 

 Blainville, so long in use before it was erroneously supplanted by Bubalis. 



— N. Hollister. 



14— Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash., Vol. 34, 1921. (77) 



