WoRMS taxon details
original description
Huys, R. (2009). Unresolved cases of type fixation, synonymy and homonymy in harpacticoid copepod nomenclature (Crustacea: Copepoda). <em>Zootaxa.</em> 2183:1-99., available online at http://www.mapress.com/zootaxa/2009/2/zt02183p099.pdf [details] Available for editors [request]
original description
(of Mesamphiascus Nicholls, 1941) Nicholls, A.G. (1941). A revision of the families Diosaccidae Sars, 1906 and Laophontidae T. Scott, 1905. (Copepoda, Harpacticoida). <em>Records of the South Australian Museum, Adelaide.</em> 7(1):65-110. (27-x-1941)., available online at https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/40980255#page/78/mode/1up page(s): 68 [details] Available for editors [request]
Present Inaccurate Introduced: alien Containing type locality
From editor or global species database
Taxonomy Sars (1905a: 380) proposed the genus Amphiascus Sars, 1905a to include Dactylopus longirostris Claus, 1863, D. minutus Claus, 1863, D. debilis Giesbrecht, 1881 and a new species Amphiascus pacificus Sars, 1905a. Nicholls (1941b: 69) transferred D. minutus to Amphiascopsis Gurney, 1927 and D. debilis to Amphiascoides Nicholls, 1941b, and he designated D. longirostris as the type species of Amphiascus (on the ground of page precedence in Sars’s (1905a) publication). Lang (1944: 19), who was unaware of Nicholls’s (1941b) subsequent designation, unfortunately also fixed D. longirostris as type of Paramphiascopsis Lang, 1944. The latter therefore becomes a junior objective synonym of Amphiascus Sars, 1905 (ICZN Arts 61.3.3 and 67.11). Other workers have overlooked Nicholls’s type fixation and incorrectly treated D. minutus as the type species (e.g. Marinov & Apostolov 1988: 153). Accepting Nicholls’s (1941b) subsequent designation and Lang’s (1944, 1948) revision of Amphiascus would imply that only the species currently assigned to Paramphiascopsis should be included in Amphiascus. A new generic name is therefore required to receive all “orphaned” species that are currently included in Amphiascus sensu Lang (1944, 1948).
The only genus-group name that has been cited in the literature as a junior subjective synonym of, and potential substitute name for, Amphiascus sensu Lang (1944, 1948) is Mesamphiascus Nicholls, 1941b (Lang 1965: 253). This genus is probably one of the most unnatural ever established in the Miraciidae, to the extent that Nicholls (1941b: 79) himself admitted having difficulties in selecting a type species. His statement that “... perhaps parvus Sars (1906, p. 162, pl. ciii) is suitable, occupying a more or less central position in the genus, and having a fairly wide distribution” does not qualify for an explicit designation that is rigidly construed (ICZN Art. 67.5; see also Vervoort 1964: 191). Consequently, the genus-group name Mesamphiascus is unavailable and therefore cannot enter into the synonymy of Amphiascus. A new genus, Sarsamphiascus gen. nov., is proposed here to accommodate all species previously placed in Amphiascus by Lang (1948) and subsequent authors. Dactylopus minutus Claus, 1863 is formally fixed as the type species. The revised species compositions of Amphiascus and Sarsamphiascus gen. nov., including all new combinations, are given in Table 3. In order to satisfy the provisions of ICZN Art. 13.1 the new genus must be accompanied by (a) a description or definition that states in words characters that are purported to differentiate it, or (b) a bibliographic reference to such a published statement. Reference is made here to Lang’s (1948: 644) generic diagnosis of Amphiascus which is equivalent to the diagnosis of Sarsamphiascus gen. nov. [details]
From editor or global species database
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