Gyrinus violaaquatica Modeer, 1780

Fery, Hans & Hájek, Jiří, 2016, Nomenclatural notes on some Palaearctic Gyrinidae (Coleoptera), Acta Entomologica Musei Nationalis Pragae 56 (2), pp. 645-663 : 655

Gyrinus violaaquatica Modeer, 1780

The taxon was originally published as ‘ Gyrinus Viola aquatica ’. MODEER (1780: 160) adapted this name from ALDROVANDI (1602: 706). One might argue that this name does not agree with Article 5 (‘Principle of Binominal Nomenclature’) of the ICZN (1999), and thus would be an unavailable name. However, ‘ Viola aquatica ’ is the name of a plant (‘water violet’, currently named Hottonia palustris Linnaeus, 1753 ), and thus ‘a compound species-group name published as separate words that are deemed to form a single word’ (Article 32.5.2.2 of the ICZN 1999; see also Article 11.9.5), which makes it an available name. The species was mentioned as ‘ aquatica ’ in the ‘ PalCat ’. Without any exception G. violaaquatica was always considered a junior subjective synonym of Orectochilus villosus (O. F. Müller, 1776) .