Acanthiza (Geobasileus) flaviventris Ashby

LeCroy, M., 2008, Type Specimens Of Birds In The American Museum Of Natural History. Part 7. Passeriformes: Sylviidae, Muscicapidae, Platysteiridae, Maluridae, Acanthizidae, Monarchidae, Rhipiduridae, And Petroicidae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 313 (1), pp. 1-287 : 185-186

Acanthiza (Geobasileus) flaviventris Ashby Geobasileus ashbyi Mathews

Acanthiza (Geobasileus) flaviventris Ashby, 1910: 137 (Lake Frome, in the interior of South Australia).

Now Epthianura aurifrons Gould, 1838 . See Mayr, 1986b: 462, and Schodde and Mason, 1999: 343.

Probable Holotype: AMNH 577621 , unsexed adult [female plumage], collected at Lake Frome , 30.48S, 139.48E ( USBGN, 1957b), South Australia, Australia, in September 1909. From the Mathews Collection (no. 11698) via the Rothschild Collection.

COMMENTS: Ashby (1910: 138) apparently based his description on a single specimen: ‘‘The specimen now described was kindly given me by Mr. Francis E. Starr, of Adelaide, who had received it in September last …’’. The data on the AMNH specimen agree with this statement, but the specimen is not marked ‘‘type’’ by Ashby; it is also missing a yellow ‘‘Figured’’ label, as the female described and figured ( Mathews, 1922a: pl. 440, upper right fig., opp. p. 340, text pp. 341, 344) was said to be the type of flaviventris . However, because Mathews (1922a: 344) had apparently considered flavigaster and flaviventris ‘‘equivalent’’ names or had confused them (see below), it is possible that the ‘‘Figured’’ label tied on AMNH 577612, discussed under Epthianura aurifrons flavescens (below), should have been tied on AMNH 577621, this probable holotype of flaviventris Ashby.

Ashby gave no measurements for the type in the original description. My measurements of the probable holotype agree with the measurements written by Ashby on the label: wing 63 mm, tarsus 19 mm. It had apparently been removed from formalin and dried, and the bill is broken. Ashby had other ‘‘dried formalin’’ specimens for which he gave measurements, but they differ from the measurements above. SAMA does not have type material (P. Horton and B. Blaylock, personal commun.), so perhaps the additional specimens mentioned were destroyed in the fire that burned Ashby’s house and part of his collection ( Whittell, 1954: 19).

Mathews (1916a: 61) provided Geobasileus ashbyi as a nomen novum for flaviventris , without indicating what name preoccupied flaviventris . Later, Mathews (1922a: 344) said he had ‘‘renamed it Geobasileus ashbyi , as an Acanthiza flavigaster had been previously proposed, and it had been a custom of purists to claim these names as equivalent’’! He probably meant Acanthiza flavigasta Diggles, 1876 , a junior synonym in the Gerygone olivacea group. Obviously, no new name was needed because flaviventris and flavigaster are not homonyms.