Conspectus cobitidum - Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research

name available is called the original spelling. The
original spelling is the correct spelling and cannot be
changed. There are only few exceptions.
9.1.1. If in a later work the spelling is changed unintentionally,
it is called an incorrect subsequent
spelling. If it is changed intentionally, then it is an
emendation. An emendation is justified if it is
made to follow requirements of the Code; all other
emendations are unjustified.
9.1.2. Incorrect spellings are not available names (they
do not exist in nomenclature). Unjustified emendations
are available names, although often invalid.
9.2. The original spelling can be corrected if there is evidence
of an inadvertent error. An inadvertent error is
an incorrect spelling not intended by the author. The
Code mentions lapsus calami, copyist's error and
printer's error as examples of inadvertent error. This
is sometimes interpreted as a list of accepted cases.
The Code lists these as examples, which means that
the list is not exhaustive. Additional cases would include,
for example, damaged font (a case is described
by Bogutskaya et al., 2005), errors introduced by a
translator (see under Triplophysini) or, with modern
technology, a file-conversion problem. An error by
the printer in deciphering a hand-written manuscript
is an inadvertent error, but it is debatable whether an
error by the author in deciphering hand-written information
(his own notes, a place name on a label, or
the signer of a letter) is an inadvertent error.
Speech recognition softwares and the commands
'search and replace' in word processors are promising
fields for inadvertent errors.
9.2.1. Latinization errors cannot be corrected. For example,
nujiangensa should have been nujiangensis
but cannot be corrected; the erroneous use of
ovis (sheep) or ovalis (ovation) instead of ovum
(egg, oval) or ovatus (oval) for an animal with an
oval shape cannot be corrected.
9.2.2. Special letters must be replaced (e.g. German
ü, ä, ö become ue, ae, oe) or modified (e.g. Spanish
ñ becomes n, non-German ö becomes o, etc.),
spaces and hyphens are suppressed, capitalised
initials become lower case, numbers must be
spelled out, etc.
9.3. Erroneous spellings of names based on personal
names is a potentially sensitive issue, resulting from
a loophole in the Code.
9.3.1. Article 31.1 explains how names based on
names of persons must be formed (see 1). Art.
31.1.3. says that a name based on a personal name
formed under arts. 31.1.1 and 31.1.2 (see 1) must
be preserved unless it is incorrect. The corollary
is that if the name is incorrect it must not be preserved.
But this article does not say what to do if
a name is not formed correctly. Common sense is
that "a name must be preserved unless incorrect"
implies that an incorrectly formed name is not to
be preserved, and that the only things that can be
done is to render it correct or to replace it. Art.
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32.5 lists the spellings that must be corrected but
the list does not include the incorrect names mentioned
in art. 31.1.3. Some authors argue that these
names therefore cannot be corrected. My interpretation
is that, if a name based on a person's
name must be formed following art. 31.1, those
formed incorrectly must be emended. This is implicit
in art. 31.1 and therefore it was not needed
to repeat it in art. 32.5. Therefore, erroneous original
spellings of names based on person's names
must be corrected.
9.3.2. This art. 31.1.3 applies only for the aspects of
the names formed under art. 31.1.1 and 31.1.2,
that is mainly ending (formed under 1 above). This
means that a name formed, for example, on the
name of a woman but with the ending -i must be
corrected in -ae. Bleeker created the name Cobitis
pfeifferi explicitly for Ida Pfeiffer, a woman,
and the name must be emended into C. pfeifferae.
If the gender of the person is not known the original
ending does not change.
9.3.3. If the name of the person is mentioned (correctly
spelt or not) and the name of the species is
misspelt, it must be corrected. Example: Sykes
(1839a) described Cobitis rupelli, which he named
for Eduard Rüppell, whose name is explicitly mentioned.
The omission of one 'p' is an inadvertent
error. The spelling of the name should have been,
and must be corrected into, ruppelli. [The omission
of the umlaut is correct; if Sykes had written
"Rüppell", ü should have been corrected into ue,
but as Sykes used "Ruppell", u should not be corrected].
9.3.4. If the name of the person is not mentioned in
the paper and can only be guessed to possibly be
a misspelling of a known name, it must remain
unchanged.
9.3.5. If there is external evidence (for example by
the author himself in a later publication) or indication
that the name is formed on a misspelling of
the name of a person unambiguously identifiable,
there are two conflicting opinions. Some authors
consider that the Code art. 32.5.1 does not allow
the emendation since it can be known that the name
is misspelt only by recourse to external information.
Others think that art. 32.5.1 allows to correct
the spelling because to misspell the name of
a person to which the species is dedicated can only
be an inadvertent error. Art. 32.5.1 lists some kinds
of inadvertent errors to be corrected but does not
mention misspelling of personal names; this is not
a problem since the Code explicitly states that
these are examples ("such as ..."), and a list of
examples is, by definition, not exhaustive [see 9.2
above].
A classical example is Barbus schwanenfeldii,
originally described by Bleeker (1854a: 517) and
dedicated to the collector "H. W. Schwanenfeld".
Later, Bleeker (1860d: 63) emended it as
schwanefeldi because the correct spelling of this