Anguilla Garsault, 1764

Denys, Gaël P. J., Daszkiewicz, Piotr, Urtizberea, Frank & Bernatchez, Louis, 2022, Diadromous fishes from Saint-Pierre and Miquelon archipelago: diagnoses, taxonomy, nomenclature and distribution, Cybium 46 (4), pp. 385-413 : 387-388

Anguilla Garsault, 1764 : Pl. 661 [Feminine; type species:

Muraena anguilla Linnaeus, 1758 ; type by subsequent monotypy by Schrank (1798: 304, 307) according to Welter-Schultes and Klug (2009: 230)].

Anguilla Thunberg, 1795 ; nomen not available according to the ICZN; see below.

Anguilla Schrank, 1798: 304 , 307 [Feminine; type species:

Muraena anguilla Linnaeus, 1758 ; type by monotypy by

Wheeler (1990: 138); on Official List of Generic Names in Zoology ( ICZN, 1992: 93 Opinion 1672)].

Anguilla Shaw, 1803: 15 , Pl. 1 [Feminine; type species:

Muraena anguilla Linnaeus, 1758 ; type by monotypy by

Cooper and Crimmen (1989: 260); Anguilla Shaw, 1804 from Sherborn (1922 -1933: 50) is a mistake].

Te r p o lepi s McClelland, 1844: 225 [Subgenus of Anguilla Schrank, 1798: 304 , 307; feminine; type species: Anguilla b r evi ros t r i s McClelland, 1844; type by subsequent designation by Blache et al. (1973: 220) according to Smith (1989: 32)].

T r ib r anchu s Peters in Müller , 1846: 193 (Masculine; type species: T r ib r anchu s anguilla r i s Peters, 1846, type by monotypy) .

Nomenclatural note

During the second part of the 19 th century, the genus nomen Anguilla Thunberg, 1795 appeared as “ Anguilla Thunberg, Nouv. Mem. , Stockholm” with an approximative year of description around 1795 ( Agassiz, 1842 -1846: 4; Gill, 1890: 159; Jordan and Davis, 1892: 666). This incertitude already intrigued Gill (1890) as he found no such nomen in the Memoirs of the Stockholm Academy. His doubt was also confirmed by Jordan and Davis (1892: 666), Jordan and Evermann (1917: 73) and Jordan (1963: 73). Sherborn (1922 -1933: 50) affirmed that “ Anguilla Thunberg 179—, Ag. Does not occur”. After checking the bibliography of the publications from Carl Peter Thunberg including 584 titles ( Thunberg, 1782 -1827; Rookmaaker, 1994), as well as publications including lists of his works ( Anonymous, 1896) and old ichthyological or zoological studies ( Carus and Engelmann, 1861; Bosgoed, 1873; Brashford, 1917), the nomen Anguilla associated to Thunberg and around 1795 was not found. So, this genus nomen appears to be a mistake and we examined its origin. Cuvier (1817: 230) was the first to attribute the genus nomen to Thunberg: “ Anguilla Thunb. et Shaw. ”. This may be due to a bad interpretation of Ahl (1789) edited by Thunberg, and then Agassiz (1842 -1846: 4) mentioned “ Anguilla Thunb. Nouv. Mem. Stock. 179.” and Günther (1870: 23) “ Anguilla (Thunberg) Cuv. Regn. Anim. ”. Thus, as there is no publication associated to the nomen Anguilla Thunberg, 1795 , the condition required by the article 11.1 of the ICZN is not fulfilled. By consequence, this nomen is not available according to the ICZN. Several authors already affirmed that this nomen should not be used as valid genus, and proposed to use the nomen Anguilla Shaw, 1803 ( Gill, 1890: 160; Jordan and Evermann, 1917: 73; Sherborn, 1922 -1933: 50; Jordan, 1963: 73; Cooper and Crimmen, 1989: 260).

However, the description of Schrank (1798: 304, 307) is earlier than the one of Shaw. Wheeler (1990: 138) suggested to consider Anguilla Schrank, 1798 as valid nomen instead of Anguilla Shaw, 1803 on the Official List of Generic Names designating Muraena anguilla Linnaeus, 1758 as its type species ( ICZN, 1992: 94).

Finally, the works of Garsault (1764), pertaining to illustrations and Garsault (1767), pertaining to their descriptions, were rediscovered by Welter-Schultes et al. (2008), impacting taxonomical and nomenclatural knowledges in zoology ( Welter-Schultes and Klug, 2009). Since this rediscovery, the validity of several genera of zoological groups was debated, along with the concept of the genus itself ( Dubois and Bour, 2010a, b, 2012; Welter-Schultes and Klug, 2011). Welter-Schultes and Klug (2009: 230) made the nomen Anguilla Garsault, 1764 available considering that Garsault’s figure represents Muraena anguilla Linnaeus, 1758 currently designated as type species of Anguilla Schrank, 1798 . Thus, Anguilla Schrank, 1798 , as well as Anguilla Shaw, 1803 , are junior homonym and objective junior synonym of Anguilla Garsault, 1764 ( Welter-Schultes and Klug, 2009: 230; Kottelat, 2013: 37). However, even if the nomen Anguilla Schrank, 1798 has been commonly used, the nomen Anguilla Garsault, 1764 has been used as a valid nomen after 1900 by Kottelat (2013: 37) and further by other authors. So, the requirement of article 23.9.1.1 of the ICZN is not fulfilled, and the nomen cannot be ignored (article 23.9). Anguilla Garsault, 1764 must be thus considered as the valid nomen.