Quercus

Coombes, Allen J. & Vázquez, Francisco María, 2021, Correct citation and lectotypification of Quercus × kabylica and Q. × numidica (Fagaceae), Phytotaxa 478 (2), pp. 275-280 : 278-279

Quercus × numidica Trabut

Most references that cite the publication of this name give two page numbers, 58 and 61. Our investigation showed that the name is published on p. 58 ( Trabut 1889b) and does not appear on p. 61. The earlier work by Trabut (1889a) may have been an attempt to publish this as a new name, however, he did not provide a description and cited Q. pseudosuber var. castaneifolia as a synonym, which Wenzig (1886) published as f. castaneifolia . Trabut (1889a) was the first to list this as var. castaneifolia and his name is therefore a stat. nov. listed as a synonym, and therefore invalid. (Art. 36.1, Turland et al. 2018).

For selection of the lectotype we only considered specimens collected by Trabut in the Forest of Guerrouch , as indicated in the original description, before the publication date of 1889 (February). One compelling specimen is MPU0161858 . On the sheet, apart from a drawing of what is presumably the tree that the specimen was collected from, there is also a hand-drawn plan indicating the foresters’ houses as mentioned in the original description “ Les maisons forestières de Guerrouch apparaissent enfin sur un plateau gazonné, mais entouré de toutes parts de feuillage sombre de Chênes.” Unfortunately, this specimen is not dated and is labelled as collected by Battandier and therefore was not considered as a lectotype .

Other materials preserved in Montpellier such as MPU0161863 , MPU0194298 , and MPU007895 , all collected by Trabut, are not considered because they are either undated, collected after 1889 or collected at a different locality to that stated in the original description. MPU007895 is the only specimen showing acorn cups and although marked as “ Type ” by Trabut, it is undated and collected at Akfadou, not the type locality .

While many of the Guerrouch specimens collected by Trabut may have been collected at the same time (some were collected in 1891), only two, MPU0161864 and P06861653 , are labelled as collected before the publication date [in this case July 1888, the date indicated by Trabut (1889b) in the original description] . P06861653 we consider a duplicate of MPU0161864 , because of the similarity of the specimens and the label details, as well as Trabut’s comments in the original description “ ce Faux-liège est rare, on n’en connait par des pieds isolé au milieu des Afares et des Chênes-liège ”, indicating that he probably only found one tree. We therefore propose MPU0161864 ( Fig. 1 ) as the lectotype .

Figures

FIGURE 1. Lectotype of Quercus ×numidica (MPU barcode MPU161864). Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris. http:// mediaphoto.mnhn.fr/media/14812995840289DPXPx5E2ky15mmY (CC BY 4.0)