NO. I HISTORY OF ZOOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE — STEJNEGER 5 



naturally they also confused binary and binominal. And there is no 

 denying the fact that the three words have been used most loosely 

 and almost indiscriminately by nearly everybody. With one notable 

 exception : the International Zoological Code of Nomenclature. 



We are not interpreting the meaning of this ambiguous word as 

 it has been used by this or that author, by this or that code. We are 

 not investigating who used it first in this or that connection; nor 

 who defined it first in this or that way. The only question before us 

 is : What is its meaning in the present International Code and how 

 did it come to have that meaning ? 



III. THE INTERNATIONAL CODE 



During the seventies and the beginning of the eighties of the last 

 century the zoological nomenclature was on the verge of chaos due 

 to the fact that the old Stricklandian Code because of its inherent 

 weaknesses, its many exceptions, and inconsistencies, its vagueness, 

 and the freedom it offered to individual interpretation, was celebrated 

 more in the breach than in the observance. Practically every taxono- 

 mist followed his own rules, or rather his own. preferences or taste. 

 Great changes in long familiar names were the order of the day due 

 to the discovery of overlooked early publications or to the substitu- 

 tion of the 1758 edition of Linnaeus' Systema Naturae for the 1766 

 edition, or to the fact that generic names in zoology had been re- 

 jected or retained, as the case might be, because of, or in spite of, 

 their having also been applied to plant genera, etc., etc. At the same 

 time the question of naming subspecies by applying a third term to the 

 specific name, thus introducing a trinominal nomenclature, was be- 

 coming acute and pressed for a solution. The result was that two lists 

 of the same group of animals from the same region, but by different 

 authors, might be so unlike as to perplex even the most expert 

 professional. 



The Committee on Zoological Nomenclature of the American As- 

 sociation for the Advancement of Science, taking cognizance of this 

 condition, published in 1877 an exhaustive report submitted at its 

 request by Dr. W. H. Dall (Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci., Nashville, 

 1877, pp. 7-56), in which the whole question was thoroughly dis- 

 cussed. It embodied the views of a large number of American tax- 

 onomists. This report is of great importance as setting forth the 

 various opinions and arguments, but it did not lead to definite results 

 with regard to some of the most debated points, such as a single 

 definite date for starting the zoological nomenclature, though it made 

 the recommendation that no specific names are to be recognized if 



