Gyrinus brinki, Ali & Jasim, 1989

Fery, Hans & Hájek, Jiří, 2016, Nomenclatural notes on some Palaearctic Gyrinidae (Coleoptera), Acta Entomologica Musei Nationalis Pragae 56 (2), pp. 645-663 : 654

Gyrinus thurtharus Ali & Jasim, 1989 and G. brinki Ali & Jasim, 1989

ALI & JASIM (1989: 81) described G. thurtharus as a new species from the area of Lake Tharthar (also spelled Therthar or Thurthar), western Iraq. The description is accompanied by several figures in two plates; strange enough, in the legends of these plates ( ALI & JASIM 1989: 83, 84) the new species is called ‘ Gyrinus brinki sp. nov. ’ instead of G. thurtharus . We assume that initially the authors intended to name the new species ‘ Gyrinus brinki ’ after the Swedish Gyrinidae specialist Per Brinck, but afterwards the authors changed their intention and called the species G. thurtharus and forgot to change the name in the figure legend.

To our knowledge the name Gyrinus brinki and the name G. thurtharus have never been dealt with together in any work after that of ALI & JASIM (1989). This is why we hereby act as First Revisers according to Article 24.2 of the ICZN (1999) and fix the precedence of the name Gyrinus thurtharus Ali & Jasim 1989: 81 over the name G. brinki Ali & Jasim, 1989: 83 , syn. nov.

Additionally, we want to deal shortly with the identity of G. thurtharus: We had no possibility to study the type material of this taxon. However, the drawing of the male aedeagus of this taxon (under the name G. brinki ) is quite distinctive and typical for the widely distributed Palaearctic Gyrinus distinctus Aubé, 1838b: 666 , known to occur also in Iraq. Therefore, we consider Gyrinus thurtharus Ali & Jasim, 1989 , syn. nov. (and with this also its objective synonym G. brinki ) to be a junior subjective synonym of Gyrinus distinctus Aubé, 1838b .