348 C. R. Osten Sacken: 



Midas at tirst, and Mydas afterwards. I sliall attempt an ex- 

 l)lanation of his course in the sequel. 



In the same passage in which Dr. G. refers (erroneously as I 

 liave shown) to Latreille, Macquart and West wo od as autho- 

 rities for the spelling Mydas, there is another assertion which, in 

 my opinion, is not sound doctrine. The passage says: „But after 

 all, there is no necessity for such hypotheses" (about a derivation 

 from Greek) „to justify a change of iiame in the present case; it is 

 seifevident that the Fabriclan nanie Mydas, adopted by La- 

 treille, Macquart and Westwood, is the only legitiniatc by right 

 of priority". By what right of priority? The most staunch adheient 

 of the right of priority will not niaintain that we shoiild consider 

 as sacred every kind of misspelling, and that, for instance, when 

 Rondan i c2L\\Qdi Brochinenra a genus o^ Cecidomyidae, we should 

 bürden our memory with this misspelling for ever? Dr. G. himself, 

 in the Verh. Z. B. Ges. Wien 1863, p. 1033, has changed Aula- 

 cephala Macq. (Oestridae) into Aulacocephala. Is it consistent that 

 a change on philological grounds should be admissible, but one on 

 the score of the spelling, inadmissible? To justify the spelling Mydas 

 Dr. G. should have proved that it was introduced by Fabricius 

 with a deliberate Intention, and that it was not a niere lapsus; 

 and just this proof Dr. G. has not furnished. As soon as the In- 

 tention can bc proved, the spelling Mydas should be adniitted, 

 and the question whether Fabricius mcant it for „un noni saus 

 signification", or had derived it from some Greek word, becomes a 

 secondary question. It was to this missing link in the argument 

 that I directed my investigation when, recontly, I took up the matter 

 again. My attention was especially arrested by the following passage 

 in Wiedemann's Preface: „Nam etiamsi hoc mirum videri 

 possit, quod errorem Ent. Syst. in Syst. Antl. repetitum 

 vidcmus, tarnen frustra aliam hujus nominis derivationeni quae- 

 sivimus". It would have been stränge indeed if, in case Fabricius 

 had misspelt the word Mydas, he should not have been made aware 

 of it during the interval between his two publications, in 1794 and 

 1805. It occurred to me to inquire whether Fabricius had not 

 used this mythological name in some other connection, for instance 

 as a specific name drawn from Mythology. As I had been inter- 

 ested in Coleoptera in my early years, I happened to remember that 

 mythological names occur aniong the coprophagous Lamellicornia, 

 and this clue easily led me to the discovery of a Scarabaeus 

 Midas, Syst. llni. p. 21, 1774; and the same in Ent. Syst. I, p. 4.'), 

 1792. Afterwards I found in Syst. Antl. p. 124 (1805) an Anthrax 



