1888.] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 319 



ON THE PROPER GENERIC NAME OF THE TUNNY AND ALBICORE. 



BY THEODORE GILL. 



Iii 1817, in the first edition of the Kegne Animal, Oavier proposed 

 two subgenera of Scomber, which he employed, however, in a generic 

 sense; one, Thynnus, was based upon the eomnion Tunny (with which 

 were associated other and smaller speeies), having moderate pectoral 

 fins; and the other, Orcynus, was based upon the Alalongaol the Med- 

 iterranean, and characterized by the long pectoral fins. Subsequently, 

 by many ichthyologists, these two genera were combined into one, un- 

 der the name Thynnus. In 1801 the present writer replaced the name 

 Thynnus by the term Orycnus, which was substituted, inasmuch as 

 Thynnus was used for a genus of hymenopterous insects by Fabricius 

 iu 1775. This name Orycnus was simply due to a misreading of the 

 name Orcynus, and was subsequently replaced by Orcynus in its correct 

 form. Nevertheless, in 18(33, Dr. J. G. Cooper, in the "Proceedings of 

 the California Academy of Natural Sciences " (vol. 3, p. 77), proposed to 

 revert to the old groups of Cuvier in the following terms, describing a 

 supposed new species, related to the Alalonga of the Mediterranean, 

 which he called Orcynus pacijicus : 



"This species is one of several confounded by sailors under the 

 Spanish names of Albicore and Bonito. The English name Tunny is 

 applied to an allied species on the coast of Europe, the Thynnus vulga- 

 ris, Cuv., and to its near representative, the T. sccundidorsalis, Storer, 

 of the eastern Americau coast. These, however, are evidently of a dif- 

 ferent genus, and as Thynnus is preoccupied in insects, the name Oryc- 

 nus, applied by Gill to the same type, may perhaps be retained, al- 

 though founded on a mistake.'''' 



Without reference to the reality of what was so evident to Dr. Cooper, 

 we need only recall that here the name Orycnus was specifically pro- 

 posed to be retained, at the same time that Orcynus was used for a 

 related genus. 



In 1888, Professor Jordan, in the "Proceedings of the Academy 

 of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia" (reprinted in the "Annals and 

 Magazine of Natural History" for 18S8), apparently overlooking this 

 specific application of the name Orycnus by Cooper, proposed the new 

 name Albicora for the same genus, inasmuch as Orcynus had been used 

 in 1815 for a genus of Carangids by liafiuesque, while Thijnnus of Cu- 

 vier, as is well known, had been pre-occupied for a genus of hymenop- 

 terous insects. 



The present author would have been glad if the name Orycnus could 

 have fallen into "innocuous djsuetude " but inasmuch as it hail been 



