Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature 58(1) March 2001 41 Case 3022 Catalogue des mammiferes du Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle by Etienne Geoff roy Saint-Hilaire (1803): proposed placement on the Official List of Works Approved as Available for Zoological Nomenclature Peter Grubb 35 Downhills Park Road, London N17 6PE, U.K. (e-mail:
[email protected]) Abstract. At least 24 generic and specific names for mammals established by Etienne GeofTroy Saint-Hilaire in his 1803 Catalogue des mammiferes du Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle (Paris) have been treated as available and valid and have been used, some very widely. Nevertheless, the status of the Catalogue as an available work has been challenged periodically between 1922 and 1993. Even though in 1963 the Catalogue had been shown to satisfy the criteria for publication, it was considered to be unavailable in Mammal species of the world edited by Wilson & Reeder (1993). The present application proposes that the nomenclatural instability be resolved by placing the work on the Official List of Works Approved as Available for Zoological Nomenclature. The generic name Scalopus and five specific names of Geoffroy (1803) would require individual conservation if the Catalogue were to be treated as unavailable. In March 1971 (Opinion 945) the specific name of Sciurus (currently Xerus or Euxerus) erythropus for the Subsaharan ground squirrel was placed on the Official List with authorship and date attributed to Geoffroy (1803). Keywords. Nomenclature; taxonomy; Mammalia; Etienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire; Catalogue des mammiferes du Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle (1803); Scalopus; Pteropus rufus; Saguinus niger; Canis niloticus; Proechimys guyannensis; Herpailurus yagouaroundi; moles; grass rats; fruit bats; tamarin monkeys; red foxes; jaguarundis; spiny rats. 1 . In 1 803 Etienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire produced the Catalogue des mammiferes du Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle, a book of 272 numbered pages in octavo describing over 290 species represented by specimens in the Paris Museum. Over 60 species were considered to be new (Table 1) and Geoffroy's names for them were used by Desmarest (1804a, 1804b, 1816-1819, 1820-1822) and numerous other authors (Tables 1 and 2). The status of the Catalogue has been questioned on the suggested grounds that it was never published. Following a submission by J.R. Ellerman and T.C.S. Morrison-Scott, an attempt was made to declare the work unavailable by Dr W.E. China (BZN 19: 289, September 1962), then Assistant Secretary to the Commission, but this was later withdrawn (China, BZN 20: 243, July 1963) in the light of comments made by Prof L.B. Holthuis (BZN 20: 242) who argued that the work had been published in the sense of the Code and was therefore available. Without addressing this episode, Wilson & Reeder (1993) in Mammal species of the
BioStor
