Page 4 June-July-Aug. 1980 No. 263 NEW YORK SHELL CLUB _ Not; 
MORE ON CHICOREUS ORIENTALIS, new name. 
M. K. Jacobson 
i f the world's leading 
Dr. Emily Vokes of Tulane University, one oO : 
inert ties on Muricidae, was kind enough to point out to me that 
the name Murex sinensis, used by Reeve in 1845 (but used earlier by 
in i : and replaced by Chicoreus orien- 
Gmelin in 1791) (see NOTES 259:4) FE eee aded by Runod aan yap 
talis by Zhang in 1965, had already be 
by the pee Gniaeekas asianus. Hence Kuroda's name should take pre- 
cedence over gnang's. But the case is somewhat more complicated 
than that. 
i but since this 
In 1822 Lamarck named a new species Murex gionganys 
d earlier, in T78 y Lightfoot, it was 
mane, 944) 20 oes euedate ty : 1841 » who overlooked the fact 
changed to Murex sinensis by Reeve in 
that this name had been used by Gmelin earlier, in 1791. ('S a won- 
5 Thus the shell 
der these old guys weren't a bit more careful! ) : 
called by Lamarck "Murex elongatus" remained without a valid name, 
Tn 1942 Kuroda came upon this situation and proposed a good, so far 
unused name, and called the shell Chicoreus aslanue- But he also 
believed that Lamarck had mistakenly included two different species 
in his elongatus. This was first apparently suspected by Sowerby 
in 1841, who called one of these two supposed species a variety of 
what Reeve called M. sinensis. Thus one of the two species included 
by Lamarck in his elongatus finally had a valid name. 
But what about the other so far unnamed species? This is where 
Zhang comes in. He proposed the name Chicoreus orientalis for this 
form. Thus Lamarck's Murex elongatus became both Chicoreus asianus 
and C. orientalis. 
Now the question is: are there really two distinct species involved? 
Dr. R. T. Abbott, who kindly discussed this with me, doesn't think 
so. AS for me -- a thorough non-muricologist -- since I don't read 
Chinese, I was unable to judge the basis on which Zhang (and Sowerby 
and Kuroda) separated the two forms. The figures which accompanied 
Zhang's article looked practically the same to me. What is the 
opinion of others? 
This verbose report appears as follows -- slightly abridged -- in 
formal scientific writing: 
Chicoreus asianus Kuroda, 1942, pl.1, fig.5 
Murex elongatus Lamarck, 1822 (non Lightfoot, 1786) 
Chicoreus asianus (pars) Kuroda, 1942 
Chicoreus orientalis nom. nov. pl.2, fig.2 (Zhang, 1965) 
(Studia Marina Sinica. 
Murex elongatus var. Sowerby, 1841 
Murex sinensis Reeve, 1845 (non Gmelin, 1791) 
Murex (Chicoreus) sinensis Kobelt, 1877 
Chicoreus asianus (pars) Kuroda, 1942 
In a nutshell -- for real! -- everythi : 
compressed, here. ything is expressed, or better, 

