EMYSGUTTATA. 29 



to obtain. Yet there can be no doubt of it, for in the Transactions of the Society 

 of the Friends of Natural History at Berlin, I find Schneider referring to this same 

 tortoise, as well as to the figure of Seba, although he now calls the animal Testudo 

 guttata. It may then be asked, why not retain the name Testudo anonyma, which 

 seems to have the right of priority. The answer is this: Schneider at first was 

 not aware that he had a new species, but seems to have regarded it as a variety 

 of the common Testudo Europrea; but afterwards, when by comparison he had 

 determined it to be a new and distinct species, then he called it Testudo guttata. 

 Thus he says,* "I have received this species from the collection of Baron Bloch 

 of Dresden, and sufficiently described it in the second supplement to the Natural 

 History of Tortoises, p. 30-32. I was then somewhat doubtful whether or not 

 to consider it as a variety of the common species, (Testudo Europrea,) from which 

 it differed both in colour and in shape of the body. Now I look upon it as a new, 

 separate species, differing from the common water tortoise principally through the 

 firm adhesion of the sternum to the shell." Why Schoepf should have changed 

 the name of this animal to punctata, with all these facts before him, and referring 

 at the same time, as he did, to Schneider's work, cannot now be determined. To 

 the name punctata there can be no objection; it is equally applicable with the 

 other, and has been adopted by many excellent naturalists; guttata, however, has 

 the right of priority. 



* Schrift. der Berl. Naturf. Freunde, b. iv. s. 3, p. 264. Ich habe diese Art aus der 

 Sammlung der Hrn. Baron Von Bloch erhalten, und im zweiten Nachtrage zur Naturgeschichte 

 der Schildkroten, s. 30-32; genau beschrieben ich war damals noch zweifelhaft, ob ich sie als 

 eine Abart von der gemeinen ansehen und stellen sollte, ob ich gleich die abweichungen im 

 Farbe und Korperbau deutlich bemerkte. Yezt sehe ich deutlich ein, dass es eine neue cigene 

 Art ist, welche sie von der gemeinen Wasserschildkroten vorziiglich durch die vestere Verbin- 

 dung des obern und untern schildes unterscheidet. 



