On the Specific Names of certain Primates. (317 



L2tIX. — On the Specific Names of certain Primates. 

 By Angel Cabrera, C.M.Z.S. 



Almost every author who has alluded to the grey, red-vented 

 Cercopithecus from South Africa seems to have been in doubt 

 as to whether the name pygerythrus^ F. Cuv., or lalandii, 

 I. Geoffr., should be assigned to it. As a recent instance, 

 Mr. Oldfield Thomas indifferently used both of them in his 

 interesting series of papers on mammals obtained during 

 the Rudd Exploration*. By adopting pygerythrus in hi8 

 excellent revision of the genus f, Mr. Pocock seems to settle the 

 question definitely ; but I cannot agree with this conclusion. 



Cercopithecus pygerythrus was described and figured by 

 F. Cuvier in the ' Histoire Naturelle des Mammiferes ' as a 

 green monkey with greenish scrotum, whereas the South- 

 African form is a grey animal and its scrotum is blue. 

 Mr. Pocock bases the selection of Cuvier's name on the 

 argument that the type of pygerythrus was " recorded from 

 the Cape" ; but that is a mistake, since I. Geoffroy conclu- 

 sively showed on three different occasions that its locality 

 was quite unknown \. Cuvier himself, in the original 

 description, does not say a word about the locality of the type, 

 but only that several specimens of the same species were 

 obtained by Delalande at the Cape. Now, in the zoological 

 part of the ' Voyage sur La Ve"nus/ p. 12, I. Geoffroy rightly 

 explains this statement as follows : — 



" Dans les immenses collections faites dans FAfrique 

 australe par Delalande, se trouvaient quelques individus de 

 l'espece prece^lemment observee par Thunberg, et avant lui 

 par Levaillant ; mais ces individus £taient tous fort jeunes. 

 Lors de l'arrivee en France des collections de Delalande, 

 M. F. Cuvier crut trouver dans ces jeunes Singes le premier 

 age d'un Cercopitheque qui vivait alors a la mdnagerie du 

 Museum, et dont ce savant zoologiste a fait le type de son 

 C. pygerythrus. C'e'tait une erreur, mais une erreur a 

 laquelle il e"tait alors difficile d'e'chapper : les affinit^s qui 

 existent entre le C. pygerythrus et l'espece de Levaillant, de 



* P. Z. S. 1905, i. p. 255 ; 1906, i. p. 160, ii. p. 780 ; 1907, p. 776 ; 1908, 

 p. 537. 



t P. Z. S. 1907, p. 735. 



\ ' Dictionnaire universel d'Histoire Naturelle,' iii. (1842) p. 305 ; 

 ' Archives du Museum d'Hist. Nat. ii. (1842) p. 78 ; ' Voyage autour du 

 Monde sur la fregate La V&ius : Zoologie,' 1855, pp. 10, 13, 29. 



Ann. d: Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 8. Vol. vi. 41 



