1888.] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 67 



NOTE ON THE GENUS DIPTERODON. 



BY THEODORE GILL. 



In 1802, Corapte <le Lacepcde proposed (Hist. Nat. des Poissons, t. 4, 

 p. 1G5) a genus called Dipterodon for six species of spinous-fiuned fishes 

 belonging to the genera now generally known as Lutjanus, Apogon, As- 

 pro, and Sciama. The only characters assigned were the development 

 of two dorsal fins and the possession of teeth in the jaws. The abso- 

 lutely worthless character of such a combination will be generally rec- 

 ognized from the names of the constituents. 



In 1829, Cuvier, in the second edition of Le Kegne Animal (t. 2, p. 

 194) used Lacepede's name Dipterodon for a geuus of which only a single 

 species was kuowu ; that species was a recently discovered one, D. cap- 

 ensis, of the Cape of Good Hope ; was unknown to Lacepcde, and had no 

 relation to any of the species known to him, as Cuvier, in fact, recog- 

 nized. He remarked that this genus, whose name is taken from La- 

 cepcde, does not comprise the same species. Such a system of nomen- 

 clature is now universally discarded, and consequently the name 

 Dipterodon can not be used in the sense in which it was employed by 

 Cuvier. 



During his life-time, Gronovius had obtained the fish subsequently 

 described by Cuvier from the Cape of Good Hope, and had given it in 

 manuscript the name of Coracinus. The Grouovian manuscript, however, 

 was not printed until 1854, when it was published under the auspices 

 of Dr. John E. Gray, into whose hands it had in due course come, and 

 of course the new names can only date from that time. 



No other names having been given to the genus Dipterodon of Cuvier, 

 the Gronovian name of Coracinus would have been in place, as Profes- 

 sor Jordan subsequently proposed. Professor Jordan in 1883, in the 

 Proceedings of the U. S. National Museum (vol. 5, p. 573), remarked 

 that " the name Dipterodon has been used by Cuv. and Val. for a genus 

 unknown to Lacepcde. This transfer of the name is not allowable, and 

 the Dipterodon of C. and V. should receive a different name, that of 

 Coracinus Gronov. (1854.)" 



Unfortunately, however, the use of the Gronovian name, as proposed 

 by Professor Jordan, is precluded by a previous employment of that 

 name in another connection. 



In 1831, Pallas, in his Zoographia Posso Asiatica (vol. 3, p. 255), had 

 proposed a genus distinguished, as he supposed, by the sheath for the 

 spinous dorsal fin, which he called Coracinus, referring to it two species 

 living in the Black Sea, the C. chalcis and the C. hoops. These species, 



