For those who missed it, a single tooth heralded the birth in December of /Maastrichtidelphys meurismeti/, Europe's first unambiguous contribution to Cretaceous marsupials (or marsup relatives). David Marjanovik provided a condensed response to the paper on the DML: http://dml.cmnh.org/2006Jan/msg00008.html . As this message concerns the nomenclature, the most relevant part of David's post is: "BTW, the specific epithet should end in -orum instead of -i. Mr Meuris and Mr Smet are two people." I have no reason to doubt that's correct but, should anybody be able to provide one, that would be most welcome. Here's why.
I've had a brief write up on the critter on-line since the publication. Yesterday, I happened to hear from one of the authors. He informed me, with certainty, that the specific name is correct as published. Apparently (this is sort of in the public domain as the message is on my guestbook):
<<You state that the ending of the species' name is linguistically incorrect. Well, this is not true! It certainly is correct!
"meurismeti" is derived from the names Meuris & Smet.
Only when the names of the honoured persons are the same, an ending of a species name should be "-orum".>>
With thanks to Dr E.W.A.M. for the feedback. I suppose I must as well include a link to our latest guestbook: http://gbook.arcor.de/tp/home/gaestebuch/guest.php3?pagename=499553
I've been looking at the ICZN code and failed to find anything to support Dr. M's certainty. Rather, it appears to me that David M's original comment is correct. It seems fully in line with Chapter 7, Formation and treatment of names, Article 31. 31.1.1. calls for accordance with Latin grammar. 31.1.2. I shall quote in full:
"31.1.2. A species-group name, if a noun in the genitive case (see Article 11.9.1.3) formed directly from a modern personal name, is to be formed by adding to the stem of that name -i if the personal name is that of a man, -orum if of men or of man (men) and woman (women) together, -ae if of a woman, and -arum if of women; the stem of such a name is determined by the action of the original author when forming the genitive.
Example. Under this provision, the species-group names podai from Poda, victori from Victor, and cuvieri from Cuvier are admissible. The names puckridgei and puckridgi may be formed from Puckridge."
Finally, I'm also wondering if anybody should happen to know of any -orum species of critter (anything covered by ICZN rules), named in honour of two people with differening surnames. Presently, this tooth is the only candidate I know of.
Cheers
Trevor
Mesozoic Eucynodonts http://home.arcor.de/ktdykes/meseucaz.htm The Mesozoic - more than just the dinosaur
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