NO. 3 OPINIONS 82 TO 90 ZJ 



OPINION 89 



Suspension of the Rules in the Case of Gkonow 1763. Com- 



MERSON 1803, GeSELLSCHAFT ScIIAUPLATZ I775 TO I781, 



Catesby 1771, Browne 1789, Valmont de Bom are 

 1768 TO 1775 



S UMMARY. — Under suspension of the rules, in any case where such suspension 

 may be considered necessary according to the interpretation now or hereafter 

 adopted by the Commission, the following works or papers are declared 

 eliminated from consideration as respects their systematic names as of their 

 respective dates: Gronow 1763, Commerson 1803, Gesellschaft Schauplatz 1775 

 to 1781, Catesby 1771, Browne 1789, Valmont de Bomare 1768 to 1775. 



Statement of case. — Commissioner David Starr Jordan has snb- 

 mitted the case in the following letter to the Secretary : 



There are certain writers in ichthyology who did not accept the Linnaean 

 system, usually because they had not heard of it, but whose papers saw the light 

 after the date of 1758. There are others whose pre-Linnaean work was 

 reprinted with additions. After the date (1758) of the Tenth Edition of the 

 Systema Naturae, many of the genera thus proposed were in due time adopted 

 by binomial authors and have found their way into the system. Those not so 

 fortunate remain as stumbling blocks, some of them extremely annoying, and 

 it is the consensus of all the ichthyologists I have consulted that it is very 

 desirable in some way to eliminate from consideration all non-binomial authors 

 on fishes whose works are printed since 1758. Even more confusing is the 

 legali;cation of the names, non-binomial, quoted by Lacepede in footnotes but 

 not adopted, from the field naturalists, Commerson and Plumier. 



In order definitely to settle the status of certain generic names which in one 

 form or another have been at times before the Commission, I propose, on the 

 advice of the Secretary to the Commission, that the cases in question as noted 

 below be settled by the use of the " Plenary Power " method on the ground 

 that the application of the Rules as interpreted by the opinions and as applied 

 to these "binary" but not "binomial" combinations will produce confusion 

 rather than uniformity. 



I therefore propose that under Suspension of Rules under Plenary Power, 

 the Commission definitely reject the works named below from consideration 

 under the Law of Priority. Under this action it is to l)e understood that no 

 generic name proposed as new or reprinted in non-binomial form from or in any 

 of the following works shall have nomenclatorial status under the Rules fas 

 of the date in question), but that sucli names shall receive nomenclatorial status 

 only through later publication and adoption liy some author whose writings, 

 under the Rules, are unchallenged. 



