8 BULLETIN 200, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



granted a separate status in nomenclature, we would logically be 

 forced to grant separate status to every use of every name. This is 

 patently absurd, and nothing is gained by giving the misapplications 

 the permanence of such acceptance into formal nomenclature. 



F. Errors. — A lapsus calami (plural, lapsus calamorum) is literally 

 a slip of the pen. In practice one may result from a temporary lapse 

 of the mind, which permits a wrong name to pass uncorrected, or a 

 wrong spelling. These are not typographical errors, since they are 

 made by the author himself. For example, an entomologist familiar 

 with ants once had occasion to refer to the little-known beetle genus 

 Gam'poporus. He inadvertently wrote it as Ga7nponotus^ a well- 

 known ant name. In a sense this error is a junior homonym of the 

 real Cariiponotus and a junior synonym of Campoporus^ but it is best 

 not to accord it any such definite status. We may have to list it in 

 synonymy to give a reference to the data published under that name, 

 but we should identify it as not having a place in nomenclature. 



Misspellings are not clearly distinguished from the preceding and 

 result from several causes. Typographical errors are not uncommon, 

 but not nearly all errors on the printed page are the fault of the type- 

 setter. They may result from ignorance or a lapse of the author, 

 from an illegible manuscript, or from misguided attempts of editors 

 or proofreaders to "correct" what appear to be errors. Like the lap- 

 sus calami, the misspelling has no status of its own, although it some- 

 times appears to be a junior synonym. In extreme cases it must be 

 carried in synonymy to avoid confusion, but it has no genotype. 



THE PRINCIPLE OF GENOTYPY 



When a genus originally including several species is found to be 

 composite according to current standards, it may be divided into two 

 or more genera. The original name must be applied to one of these, 

 according to the Rules. It would have been possible to tie the generic 

 name to the first species listed under it or to some other specifically 

 defined species, but the Rules instead adopt the principle of tying 

 each generic name to a type species, just as each specific name is an- 

 chored to a type specimen. This type species is called the genotype 

 or type of the genus.^ 



* The word "genotype" has been the subject recently of considerable discussion, which 

 has resulted in its replacement in some works by other terms. The argument that the 

 word needs to be replaced because of confusion with the word "genotype" in genetics is 

 completely false. The uses are so different that direct confusion is most unlikely, and. 

 if a change is to be made, the latter name should be the one changed, since it is younger 

 by many years. 



Several persons have suggested that the etymologically proper form of this word is 

 generitype or generotype. In a sense they are right, and in another sense wrong. From 

 the Latin word genus, with genitive (jeneris, we would get generitype (or less likely though 

 possible generotype). From the Greek word genos, with genitive geneos, we would get 

 genotype. Since a large majority of our technical terms come from the Greek, genotype 

 Is correct and to be preferred. Since some of our technical terms come from Latin, 

 generitype cannot be said to be wrong. 



