EAST AFRICAN MAMMALS 1N NATIONAL MUSEUM. 47 
Order ARTIODACTYLA. 
Family SUID. 
Genus KOIROPOTAMUS Gray. 
1843. Koiropotamus Gray, List Spec. Mamm. Brit. Mus., p. xxvii. (Sus afri- 
canus Schreber, not Gmelin=Sus koiropotamus Desmoulins.) 
1843. Choiropotamus Gray, List Spec. Mamm. Brit. Mus., p. 185. (pro Koiro- 
potamus.) 
1854. Potamocherus Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1852, p. 130. (New name 
for Koiropotamus Gray and Choiropotamus Gray, supposed to be pre- 
occupied by ‘‘ Chaeropotamus Cuvier.’’) 
1863. Nyctochoerus Heveutn, Nov. Act. Acad. Caes. Leop.-Carol., vol. 30, Nachtrag 
zweiten Abhandl., p.7. (K. hassama.) 
1921. Koiropotamus Howuuster, Proc. Biol. Soc. Washington, vol. 34, p. 77. 
March 31. 
1921. Choiropotamus Tuomas, Proc. Biol. Soc. Washington, vol. 34, p. 135. 
June 30. 
The generic name Koiropotamus Gray, 1843, for the African bush 
pigs or river hogs is usually cited as a nomen nudum, but it is without 
question a valid name. Although if is written ‘‘ Choiropotamus”’ in 
one place in the body of the text, it appears in the “Systematic 
List’’ and in the index of Gray’s work only as Koiropotamus and was 
evidently taken direct from the specific name koiropotamus of Des- 
moulins. Furthermore, at the time Gray proposed the substitute 
name Potamocherus he cited in synonymy only the name Koiro- 
potamus from his 1843 work and cites Choiropotamus Gray only 
from the Annals and Magazine of Natural History for October, 1852. 
It is maintained therefore that Choiropotamus Gray, 1843, is a lapsus 
for Koiropotamus, which latter is not invalidated by the earlier 
Chaeropotamus Desmarest, 1822, and is the proper name for the 
African bush pigs. 
In reply to my preliminary note calling attention to the necessity 
for this change, Mr. Thomas, while agreeing that Koiropotamus is 
valid nomenclaturally, maintains that Choiropotamus should be used 
pending an official ruling on the relative priority of names used in 
introduction and body of the same work. He believes that Gray at 
this time, finding the classically incorrect Kotropotamus in existence, 
deliberately corrected it by the alteration of K into Ch. If this was 
done, the correction was made in the page proof, after the index and 
systematic list were set up. The systematic and alphabetical indices 
and the main body of this book are of equal date. It matters little 
which was actually printed first if they were distributed at the same 
time, and the International Code does not provide for page precedence 
in names appearing at the same time in the same work, except as a 
guide to later selection by the first reviser. Such cases would seem 
