20 
Gill, Pedioccetes and Pooccztes. 
fAuk 
I Jan. 
Auk, XVI, Jan. , 1899, p y Z>a-z3 . 
THE GENERIC NAMES PEDIOCCETES AND 
POOCcETES. 
BY THEODORE GILL. 
The two generic names, Pedioccetes and Pooccetes , have been 
much animadverted upon, but have nevertheless been adopted in 
the A. O. U. Check-List of North American Birds. These names 
were adopted because it was supposed that they were the first 
ones published for the genera involved. That such was not the 
case will be made evident. Not only were they not first pub- 
lished, but before publication Baird himself substituted for them 
names of entirely different etymology and only resembling them 
in superficial appearance. The substitute names were of later 
formation — “happy afterthoughts” — though published first in 
the same volume. The substitute names were also adopted gen- 
erally, and not until long afterwards were the abandoned names 
taken up again and generally adopted. 
I. 
In 1858 Baird published his great work on the ‘ Birds of North 
America,’ under cover of the ‘ Reports of Explorations and Sur- 
veys ’ for a Pacific railroad, 1 volume IX.’ In the descriptive 
portion he introduced, as new genera Poocates (p. 447) and Pedi- 
occetes (p. 625), but in the table of the higher groups, preceding 
the descriptive portion, he used the names Pooecetes and Pedioe- 
cetes, referring to the pages on which the genera were on following 
pages described. 
It is known that Baird submitted partial proofs of his work to a 
correspondent and had been informed that -caetes was not a legiti- 
mate component, and that -oecetes should replace it. The assump- 
tion that Baird thus submitted to has been maintained ever since. 
For example, Mr. Elliot, in the October (1898) number of ‘ The 
Auk,’ has remarked (p. 295) that “ neither could ireSiov and 
oiKeTrjs be correctly compounded into Pedioccetes, two blunders in 
one word.” 
