Coluber chersea, Linnaeus, 1758
|
publication ID |
https://doi.org/ 10.1080/00222930802126888 |
|
persistent identifier |
https://treatment.plazi.org/id/03970B15-FFE5-563A-3B1E-EF5515B6F817 |
|
treatment provided by |
Felipe |
|
scientific name |
Coluber chersea |
| status |
|
Two specimens have been found, one in UUZM and one in NRM.
Description of specimen 1
Specimen. UUZM 144 View Materials (old Nr. 128), Donation: J. Alströmer / C. Von Linne´. Original jar present but with a printed label and not the one by Thunberg, which probably is lost. Printed label by Holm on the original jar: Uppsala Univ. Linnésamling Nr 144, Mus. Alstr.-Linn. Nr 17. Printed label by Holm in the actual jar: Uppsala Univ. Zool. Mus. Linnésamlingen nr. 144 Coluber chersea. Subadult female .
Mensural characters. SVL: 286, TL: 32.5, HL: 13.09, HW: 9.93, HD: 5.59, DbE: 6.44, RML: 15.89, DbER: 4.76/4.81, DbES: 1.67/1.76, EyeHD: 2.63/2.70, EyeVD: 2.12/2.26, FL: 2.15, FW: 1.44, RL: 2.15, RW1: 1.02, RW2: 2.24, Nas: 2.12/2.06, Nos: 0.94/0.88, DbNasSupL: 2.44/2.36, DbNosSupL: 1.48/1.31, DL: 1.86 (all measurements in mm).
Scalation characters. PreV: 5, Ventr: 143, DorsN: 21, DorsMb: 21, DorsT: 17, DR23: 6, DR21: 7, DR19: 96, DR17: 101, Scd: 34/34, SupL: 9/8, SubL: 12/10, Lor: 5/6, CircO: 10/10, SubLSubO: 4–5/4–5, Apic: 2, Canth: 2/2, IntC: 5, IntSupO: 0/0, SbE: 23, Crws: 28, GulR: 4/5, GulT 26/27. Undivided rostral scale, nasal scales separated from the rostral by one nasorostral scale; nasals not connected to the circumocular scales; undivided nasals; nostrils in the middle of the nasal scales; 2/3 scales between the circumoculars and the supralabials, but the row is not complete; undivided supraoculars; subcaudal scales divided.
Colour pattern. Very pale; most probably entirely dark belly; head pattern once formed by two separated dark oblique bands forming a barely visible inverted V mark on the head; dorsal pattern formed most probably by an undivided, sharp tipped, zigzag band, but neither ZZW nor ZZW2 could be counted ( Figure 3 View Figure 3 ).
Description of specimen 2
Specimen. NRM 5994 (at the time of the survey NRM, 550010). Four labels attached to the jar: Newest label by G. Johansson: Vipera berus Lin. ; 204; 1 ex.; Smoland 1749; Col. A. Holm. Label probably made by Fredrik Smitt (1839–1904) curator at NRM vertebrate section: Vipera chersea ; Col. Chersea. 1091; A. Holm. 1749. P. 246 t. 6.; Äsping. Svec. Pomer. Smolaend. Label by Dalman: Vipera Chersea. Label by Quensel: Col. Chersea.; 1091.; A. Holm. 1749. P. 246 t.6.; asping. Svec. Pomer. Smoland. Sub adult female.
Mensural characters. SVL: 232, TL: 27, HL: 12.11, HW: 9.03, HD: 5.24, DbE: 5.80, RML: 14.19, DbER: 4.35/4.37, DbES: 1.60/1.65, EyeHD: 2.04/2.15, EyeVD: 1.70/1.75, FL: 2.71, FW: 2.30, RL: 2.21, RW1: 0.83, RW2: 2.27, Nas: 2.03/1.96, Nos: 0.90/0.93, DbNasSupL: 2.34/2.47, DbNosSupL: 1.39/1.35, DL: 1.69 (all measurements in mm).
Scalation characters. PreV: 5, Ventr: 144, DorsN: 23, DorsMb: 21, DorsT: 17, DR23: 14, DR21: 16, DR19: 87, DR17: 109, Scd: 33/32, SupL: 8/8, SubL: 10/8, Lor: 2/2, CircO: 8/8, SubLSubO: 4–5/4–5, Apic: 2, Canth: 2/2, IntC: 6, IntSupO: 3/3, SbE: 7, Crws: 13, GulR: 4/3, GulT 24/28. Undivided rostral scale; nasals separated from the rostral by one nasorostral scale; nasals not connected to the circumoculars; nasal fragmented at the middle on the left, at the middle and at the top on the right side; nostrils in the middle of the nasal scales; 1/1 scales between the circumoculars and the supralabials, but the row is not complete; undivided supraoculars; subcaudals divided.
Colour pattern. Very pale; most probably dark belly; head pattern once formed by two separated dark oblique bands forming a barely visible inverted V mark on the head; dorsal pattern formed by an undivided, sharp tipped, zigzag band, formed by many windings on the body (ZZW could not be counted) and 23/25 ZZW2 ( Figure 4 View Figure 4 ).
Review of the literature
Coluber chersea is the venomous snake species numbered 184 in Systema Naturae ( Linnaeus 1758: 218). Linnaeus cited two of his own references (1746b, 1749c) and Aldrovandi (1640) as Aldr. Serp. 197. Aspis colore ferrugineo. He provided these scale counts for the ventrals and subcaudals: 150-34.
Linnaeus dealt in writing with this kind of snake for the first time in Animalia per Sveciam observata, which although written 1736 was published in 1742. He had at this stage just heard of it.
In the travel account (1745b) when heading to the Baltic islands in 1741 for an officially commissioned journey he again mentioned this poisonous snake äsping or aesping, a Swedish vernacular name for the small reddish adder. Subsequently, he listed it in Fauna Svecica (1746b: 97) as species 261, still not having observed it himself. Only rumours formed his knowledge about it and he had asked his disciples to search for it in their provinces.
His announcement for a specimen was successful and in 1749, just after he had returned to Uppsala from the journey to Skåne, the southern part of Sweden, he published a comprehensive description of the snake in the journal of the Swedish Academy of Sciences (1749c). This is before he used binominal nomenclature. He had eventually received four specimens. The first came from somewhere outside Uppsala, most probably sent to Linnaeus by the Rev. Hudelin, but Linnaeus was still doubtful if it was the true species. On the return route through Småland on August 3, 1749 [add 11 days for modern calendar], he received one specimen from Rev. Ulmgren collected in Angelstad and later, but unclear exactly when, two from schoolmaster Kallenberg in Nötbeck (now Nottebäck). In his diary (see Gullander 1975) Linnaeus very briefly described the snake collected by Ulmgren, as hissing louder than other snakes do, that it is more fierce and that the snake [will be] described in more details from the preserved specimen. Indeed, in the journal he described it more scientifically: its length being more than 1 kvarter [i.e. quarter of an ell 515 cm], its head in respect of form, pattern and the arrangement of scales, that the number of dorsal scales equals 21, and gave a short description of the teeth. His opinion that it was a species different from the adder was based on these characters: a black spot on the extremity of the tail, other small things particular to the scales on the head (statement without further elucidation), and the number of ventral scales being together 184 while the sum of the adder’s, which possesses 145 ventral and 36 subcaudal scales, is 181. The description was followed by a review of how people treat the effects of its bite and a review of poisonous effects from other foreign snake genera. The specimen was illustrated on plate VI of the journal ( Figure 5 View Figure 5 ) .
Linnaeus did not point out which of the four specimens he used neither when describing nor when illustrating it. Linnaeus indexed the same individual, obviously a female, in two subsequent works: Fauna Svecica (1761: 103–104), as species 285, and Systema Naturae (1766: 377), as species 184. Accounts on the collection of the four specimens that he eventually received can also be studied in his book, Skånska Resan (1751).
The references in Systema Naturae ( Linnaeus 1758, 1766) to Aldrovandi (1640: 197), which is a figure with a caption in Systema Naturae were beyond doubt based on Aldrovandi’s name ‘Aspis colore ferrugineo’, which happens to have a resemblance with the Swedish vernacular name ‘ asping ’ and the rusty colour of the snake.
Review of the catalogue data
UUZM catalogues. Catalogue I does not mention the existence of C. chersea in the collection in the 1780s. Two specimens (a and B) were recorded in the Alströmer/ Linné donation in Catalogue II, compared to just one in Catalogues III, IV and VI. Another specimen (B) in the Thunberg donation was recorded in Catalogues III, V, VI, VII and VIII.
Thunberg mentioned C. chersea in his printed catalogue (1787a: 21) in the Alströmer/Linné donation. In the footnote he made the remark: ‘‘ Variat scutis & squamis 148:32. 147:36. 144:44.’’ The first specimen was probably a female, whereas the other two were males. Thunberg either copied the scale numbers from a literature source (which we could not identify), or he might never have donated the specimens to the museum, only noted their scale numbers, and for this reason they were never mentioned in the catalogues. Donatio 1775. Carol. Petr. Thunberg contained one Coluber chersea var. with the scale counts 150:33 given by Thunberg (1787a: 30). Based on the scale ratio we deem it to be a female.
Lönnberg (1896: 36), Holm (1957: 43) and Wallin (2001: 123) recorded C. chersea in the Alströmer/Linné donation, but made no remarks as to the type status of the specimen. According to Nilsson (1842: 55), Coluber chersea was a young female of V. berus . Nilsson (1842: 55) related the incidence in Uppsala in 1821 when Thunberg showed him a small snake in spirit with the label Coluber chersea , and assured him that this specimen had been kept in the Academy Museum since the time of Linnaeus, and that it was an original specimen for the Linnaeus description. Unfortunately, Nilsson (1842) gave no further details about the specimen he observed but he determined together with Thunberg that is was a juvenile Vipera berus .
NRM catalogues. Catalogue IX does not mention the taxon in the collection. The species was first mentioned in Quensel’s ‘ Catalogus Amphibiorum … ’ (Catalogue X). A single specimen was recorded, with a complete reference to Linnaeus (1749c) (Act. Holm. 1749. – 246. t. 6.). Similarly, only a single specimen was recorded in Catalogue XII by Swartz. Catalogues XIII and XIV by Dalman mention the species as well. Andersson (1899) did not list C. chersea among the Linnaean types .
Discussion
The UUZM catalogues show the presence in the 1790s of two specimens in the collection, both included in the Alströmer / Linné donation. Later , one specimen (B) was correctly mentioned in the catalogues as part of the Thunberg donation. Most probably the specimen UUZM 144 View Materials is the specimen marked as a in the catalogues. It is of eighteenth-century origin, but based on the available information we cannot trace its identity. It might be the specimen collected in Uppsala or in Nötbeck. The specimen B in the manuscript catalogues is most probably Thunberg’s (1787a: 30) Coluber chersea var. This specimen might be the normal coloured juvenile female, with 150 ventrals and 33/33 subcaudals, preserved under UUZM 56262 View Materials (old no. 442) together with two normal coloured specimens and labelled Vipera berus Museum Thunberg. As further details could not be found of these snakes, we cannot consider it as a primary, secondary or tertiary syntype . The specimen UUZM Nr. 144 is certainly from eighteenth-century origin, and may be part of the syntype series, although based on our present information we cannot assess it as a primary, secondary or tertiary syntype.
The NRM Catalogues X and XII mention a single specimen of C. chersea , specimen NRM 5994. The labels and the catalogues recorded it as Coluber chersea 1091 , a number that refers to the page number in the thirteenth edition of Systema Naturae ( Gmelin 1789) in which the taxon was listed. Additionally, the distribution of the taxon based on the above mentioned work, Swedish Pomerania (areas at the southern coast of the Baltic Sea between the Vistula, Notec, Warta and Odra rivers at that time dominion of Sweden, now NE Germany and Poland) and ‘Smoland’ (i.e. the province Småland, southern Sweden) was noted by the curators, together with a complete reference to Linnaeus (1749c). The specimen NRM 5994 is apparently one of the four specimens that Linnaeus had at hand when he in 1749 (1749c) described the snake called äsping. Its body is still curled in the same way as presented on the detailed plate in the work of Linnaeus ( Figure 5 View Figure 5 ), the number of ventral scales at the curves counted on the preserved specimens and those on the plate are the same. This resemblance in body configuration due to fixation between some fish specimens and those shown on different plates has already been documented ( Fernholm 1978; Fernholm and Wheeler 1983).
No one has previously considered it a possible Linnaean type, thus it was found in the main collection, not in the separate Linnaeus collection.
Linnaeus lamented in a letter of 24 October 1749 to his good friend in Stockholm, Abraham Bäck, that it is not possible to find an artist in Uppsala to illustrate a snake ( Linnaeus 1910: 88–89). We can therefore presume that Linnaeus sent the specimen to the Royal Academy in Stockholm, who would publish the article, to be drawn for the paper, and that it was kept in the Royal Academy collection and later transferred to NRM. The specimen is the primary syntype .
There are three other specimens in NRM that were assigned by Dalman to Coluber Chersea : specimen NRM 6092, one of the two specimens under NRM 6094, and one specimen NRM 6091. The latter was recorded by Quensel in Catalogue X as ‘ Species ignotae l. Specimen by Quensel novae. Coluber 6’ and denoted by Dalman ‘ Coluber C. ’, which we presume refers to Coluber Chersea. Nothing indicates that any of these specimens could be primary, secondary or tertiary syntypes.
Taxonomic and nomenclatural aspects. Schwarz (1936) gave the type locality of C. chersea as Småland, S. Sweden. Bernström (1943) made a few remarks on the type specimen and noted its provenance of the type specimen as being Angelstad in Småland. According to Bruno (1985) the type locality is ‘Svecia depressis’, while in the opinion of Mertens and Wermuth (1960) it is Sweden, an opinion shared by McDiarmid et al. (1999). Nilson et al. (2005: 237) referred to Linnaeus (1749c) and pointed out the collection locality of the specimen, Angelstad, Småland, SE Sweden. McDiarmid et al. (1999: 397) considered the specimen UUZM 144 to be the holotype of Coluber chersea without any further remarks. None of these proposals was based on the type series and thus, according to Art. 76.1 and Art. 73.2.3 ( ICZN 1999), should not be considered valid.
Linnaeus cited several sources when he described the taxon, so, consequently we have a syntype series consisting of one primary syntype, a female described in Systema Naturae ( Linnaeus 1758), untraced secondary syntypes described by Linnaeus (1746b), three secondary syntypes reported by Linnaeus in 1749 ( Linnaeus 1749c) and another secondary syntype described and depicted by Aldrovandi (1640) which cannot be identified and, what we have found in our research, never became part of a museum collection.
As indicated above, the specimen NRM 5994 is the primary syntype described by Linnaeus as C. chersea (1749c) and we hereby designate it the lectotype of Coluber chersea based on Art. 74.1 of the Code ( ICZN 1999) and restrict the type locality according to Art. 76.2 ( ICZN 1999) to Angelstad, Småland, southern Sweden. Lectotype: NRM 5994; Angelstad, Småland, southern Sweden; Leg. Petrus Ulmgren; 14.08.1749.
One specimen labelled C. prester was identified in the collection of UUZM; none was identified in NRM.
Description of the specimen
Specimen. UUZM 145 View Materials (formerly Nr. 129), Donation: J. Alströmer / C. Von Linne´. Printed label on the original jar: Uppsala Univ. Linnésamling Nr 145 Mus. Alstr.- Linn. Nr 18. Printed label in the jar: Uppsala Univ. Zool. Mus. Linnésamlingen nr. 145 Coluber prester. Original jar present, but with a printed label, not the one written by Thunberg, which is most probably lost. Adult female .
Mensural characters. SVL: 628, TL: 76, HL: 22.45, HW: 16.59, HD: –, DbE: 9.53, RML: 27.65, DbER: 8.05/–, DbES: 2.98/–, EyeHD: 3.38/–, EyeVD: 2.72/–, FL: 4.42, FW: 4.02, RL: 3.75, RW1: 1.55, RW2: 4.50, Nas: 3.67/–, Nos: 1.88/–, DbNasSupL: 4.57/–, DbNosSupL: 2.72/–, DL: 5.35.
Scalation characters. PreV: 5, Ventr: 141, DorsN: 21, DorsMb: 21, DorsT: 17, DR23: 6, DR21: 7, DR19: 104, DR17: 118, Scd: 32/32, SupL: 8/8, SubL: 11/11, Lor: 5/4, CircO: 9/10, SubLSubO: 4–5/4–5, Apic: 2, Canth: 2/2, IntC: 7, IntSupO: 2/2, SbE: 12, Crws: 19, GulR: 4/4, GulT 28/26. Undivided rostral, nasals separated from the rostral by one nasorostral scale; nasals not connected to the circumoculars; nasal fragmented at the middle on both sides; nostrils in the middle of the nasal scales; 2/2 scales between the circumoculars and the supralabials, but the row is not complete; undivided supraoculars; subcaudals divided.
Colour pattern. The specimen is completely black dorsally and ventrally but the hue has faded over time. First supralabials are completely black, those starting from below the eye being half white. The head is badly damaged and several abrasions can be found on the body ( Figure 6 View Figure 6 ). It was most probably killed with a stick.
Review of the literature
Coluber Prester is No. 287 in Fauna Svecica ( Linnaeus 1761: 104). Linnaeus provided a single reference ‘ Pet. Mus. 17. N. 104. Vipera anglica nigricans’ ( Petiver 1695). He gave the following scale counts: 153 ventrals and 32 subcaudals. The specimen was most probably a female. Linnaeus denoted the dialectal name of the snake for the region ‘Smoland’ being bose, described the form and arrangements of the scales on the body, noted the number of dorsal scales (21) and mentioned that this dark snake has a short tail and possesses very strong venom.
The species was later indexed as No. 185 in Systema Naturae ( Linnaeus 1766: 377). Linnaeus referred to Fauna Svecica ( Linnaeus 1761) and the work by Petiver (1695) (misspelling the name of Petiver’s adder, nigricans as nigrans). The number of scales quoted, 152-32 differs in ventrals by one. The specimens in the two works should be the same; most probably Linnaeus made an error when copying the number from his previous work.
Vipera anglica nigricans of Petiver (1695) is the melanistic, black coloured adder inhabiting England, which in Petiver’s opinion might be similar (cited with a question mark by the author) to Schvvenckfeld’s (1603: 167) Vipera nigra , which was a melanistic adder.
Review of the catalogue data
UUZM catalogues. The catalogues in UUZM show the presence of two specimens in the collection. Catalogue I of 1781 lists C. Praester (sic) without indication of the number of specimens .
One specimen (a) of C. Praester (sic) from the Alströmer/Linné donation was mentioned by Thunberg in Catalogues II, III, IV and VI.
Another specimen (B) from the Thunberg donation was recorded in Catalogues III, V, VI, VII and VIII.
Thunberg (1787a: 21 and 30) reported one specimen of Coluber Praester (sic), possessing 148 ventral and 32 subcaudal scales, in the Alströmer/Linné donation, but it was not listed by him from the Thunberg collection.
Similarly, Lönnberg (1896: 36), Holm (1957: 43) and Wallin (2001: 124) mentioned a single specimen in the Alströmer/Linné donation but none of them made any remarks on its type status.
NRM catalogues. Hornstedt (Catalogue IX) mentioned C. prester as present in the collection. Quensel’s note ‘v’ probably denotes a single specimen.
Quensel recorded in his ‘ Catalogus Amphibiorum … ’ (Catalogue X), two specimens of C. Prester , and noted that one specimen has more scales than reported for the taxon in Systema Naturae by Gmelin (1789) and that one specimen from Gotland (the island in SE Sweden) has the right colour (completely black specimen), whereas the other is a variety of Coluber berus .
Swartz’s Catalogue XII contains a single specimen of C. prester . Dalman (Catalogues XIII and XIV) recorded the species as well, but he did not mention the number of preserved specimens.
Andersson (1899) did not mention C. prester in the Linnaean collection.
Discussion
The NRM catalogues show the presence of two specimens in the collection during Conrad Quensel’s time, one of them with known origin (i.e. Gotland). The subsequent Catalogue XII by Swartz records only a single specimen. Most probably the specimen referred to in the latter catalogue as Coluber prester is the adult male Natrix natrix NRM 20167. The specimen, collected on Gotland, bears labels by Quensel and Smit who recorded it as Coluber prester. Swartz also considered the specimen to be C. prester , as he depicted it on plate 51 of Svensk zoologi ( Swartz 1811) as Coluber prester. The other specimen mentioned in Catalogue X by Quensel could not be traced; it could have been discarded or identified later as another species. The present information does not allow us to identify either of the two individuals as primary, secondary or tertiary syntypes.
We believe that the specimen in UUZM in the Alströmer/Linné donation is the primary syntype described in Fauna Svecica ( Linnaeus 1761). The number of ventral scales given by Linnaeus (1761, 1766) and Thunberg (1787a) do not agree, probably due to the high number of scales that had to be counted; but the number of subcaudal scales is the same. Most probably, this was an adult specimen and this was the reason for the matching subcaudal scale counts. We have also counted 32 subcaudal scales on the specimen UUZM 145. As both works ( Linnaeus 1761, 1766) dealt with the same specimen, probably Linnaeus possessed only this single specimen.
The specimen B in UUZM originating from the donation by Thunberg, might have been lost, discarded, or it may have been referred in the printed catalogue by Thunberg (1787a: 30) as Coluber Berus : niger possessing 144 ventral and 39 subcaudal scales. One melanistic and a normal coloured V. berus with dark ground colour is housed in UUZM, catalogued as 56254 (old no. 435) ( Vipere berus var.) which was once part of the Museum Thunberg collection. The melanistic specimen possesses 142 ventral scales (preventrals included) and 40 subcaudal scales, thus, if the scale numbers provided by Thunberg are correct, might fit to his Coluber Berus : niger. Further information about the specimen could not be gathered, thus at present we cannot consider it a as primary secondary or tertiary syntype.
Taxonomic and nomenclatural aspects
Schwarz (1936) was aware of only the first edition of Fauna Svecica ( Linnaeus 1746b). Consequently, he considered the citation ‘ Faun. Svec. 287’ in Systema Naturae ( Linnaeus 1766: 377) an error and argued that the form was probably based on Petiver’s 1695 work, thus having the type locality England. Mertens and Wermuth (1960) proposed a restriction of the type locality hoc loco, i.e. Sweden, which was a reiterated by Nilson et al. (2005). McDiarmid et al. (1999) gave the type locality ‘probably Sweden’. They considered the specimen UUZM Nr. 145 the holotype of C. prester , without any further remarks. None of these proposals was based on the type series and thus, according to Art. 76.1 and Art. 73.2.3 ( ICZN 1999), should not be considered valid.
Linnaeus (1761) described one specimen and additionally referred to Petiver (1695), thus we have to deal with a syntype series. The one or several specimens used by Petiver when describing the taxon have most probably disappeared by now and most likely they were not even part of a museum collection. They are nevertheless secondary syntypes. Similarly the specimen(s) recorded by Schvvenckfeld (1603) remain(s) untraced tertiary syntype (s). We have shown above that the specimen UUZM 145 is of 18th century origin and it was included in all available catalogues. Additionally, it matches Linnaeus’s description. We propose the designation of specimen UUZM 145 as the lectotype of Coluber prester Linnaeus, 1761 based on Art. 74.1 of the Code ( ICZN 1999). The provenance of the specimen is not known. Linnaeus in Fauna Svecica (1761: 104) listed the snake as having the dialectal name ‘ bose ’ in Småland. It is likely to have been collected in Småland, southern Sweden. Herjulfsdotter and Svanberg (2005: 137) have shown that this dialectal term is restricted to the provinces of eastern Småland and northern Blekinge for a black adder. We propose the restriction of the type locality according to Art. 76.2 of the Code ( ICZN 1999) to Småland, southern Sweden. Lectotype: UUZM 145; Småland, southern Sweden.
Coluber [ berus , chersea ] sp.
One more specimen with possible type status has also been identified in NRM ( Figure 7 View Figure 7 ) .
Description of the specimen
Specimen. NRM 5995 (at the time of the survey NRM, 550007). Four labels attached to the jar. Label by Andersson: ‘ Vipera berus (L); Svenska ormar; No. 73; Mus. Drottningholm; Dock ej Linneansk typ. Ej beskr. Af Linne´.’ [ Vipera berus (L.); Swedish snakes; No. 73; Mus. Drottningholm; Although not Linnaean type. Not described by Linnaeus]. Label by Gunnar Johansson, taxidermist in NRM in 1969: ‘1826’. Label by Dalman: ‘ Coluber (C. Chersine Dm.) ’. Drottningholm label ( Figure 8 View Figure 8 ): ‘ Coluber (0) ’, plus number 12. Juvenile male.
Mensural characters. SVL: 206, TL: 31, HL: 11.16, HW: 8.53, HD: 4.70, DbE: 5.57, RML: 12.28, DbER: 4.09/4.09, DbES: 1.55/1.53, EyeHD: 2.08/2.27, EyeVD: 1.72/ 1.77, FL: 2.36, FW: 2.22, RL: 1.99, RW1: 1.03, RW2: 2.44, Nas: 1.84/1.84, Nos: 0.74/0.65, DbNasSupL: 2.31/2.20, DbNosSupL: 1.44/1.37, DL: 1.61.
Scalation characters. PreV: 6, Ventr: 139, DorsN: 21, DorsMb: 21, DorsT: 17, DR23: 6, DR21: 7, DR19: 104, DR17: 115, Scd: 40/40, SupL: 9/9, SubL: 12/11, Lor: L, CircO: 10/9, SubLSubO: 4–5/4–5, Apic: 2, Canth: 2/2, IntC: 8, IntSupO: 3/3, SbE: 14, Crws: 19, GulR: L, GulT 25/24. Undivided rostral, nasals separated from the rostral by one nasorostral scale; nasals not connected to the circumoculars; undivided nasals; nostrils in the middle of the nasal scales; 2/2 scales between the circumoculars and the supralabials, but the row is not complete; undivided supraoculars; subcaudals divided.
Colour pattern. Very pale; most probably dark belly; head pattern once formed by two separated dark oblique bands forming a barely visible inverted V mark on the head; dorsal pattern formed by an undivided, sharp tipped, zigzag band.
Review of the catalogue data
It was listed by Quensel in the Catalogus Amphibiorum … (Catalogue X) among the unknown species ‘ Species ignota e. Nova ’ as number 12. He recorded it as one specimen that originated from the Drottningholm Museum and mentioned that it resembles very much C. Chersea . Similarly Swartz and Dalman mentioned it as an unknown species. Dalman observed its resemblance to C. chersea , thus noted it on the label ‘ Coluber Chersine ’.
It was not mentioned by Andersson (1899). Andersson did not consider it a Linnaean type, as it was not described separately by Linnaeus (based on the information on the label in the hand of Andersson presented above).
Discussion
It can be observed on Figure 7 View Figure 7 that the specimen has a piece of twine in the chin. Wheeler (1991) described in detail the disposition of fishes in UUZM, and noted that often the specimens are suspended by twine attached to the inside of the lid. The twine on this specimen is a very bright colour, so we deem it cannot be from the time when it was part of the Drottningholm collection.
This specimen was certainly part of the royal collection, as it bears a uninominal label, similar to other specimens originating from the Drottningholm collection ( Figure 8 View Figure 8 ). Fernholm and Wheeler (1983) mentioned that NRM specimens originating from this collection bear similarly printed labels, mostly binominal and they are of the opinion that the specimens described by Beckman (1911) as present on most of the jars at the king’s Museum at Ulriksdal in 1765.
The specimen was not described by Linnaeus in his dissertations dealing with the king’s collection ( Linnaeus 1749b, 1754, 1764b). We discovered it in the main collection, not in the separate Linnaean collection. Based on the available information this specimen cannot be identified as part of the syntype series of any of the three Coluber specimens. As it originated from the royal collection, the specimen may have type status, but this requires further documentation. It could have been one of the available specimens of C. berus or C. chersea but was not separately described. It should be noted that Linnaeus did not give a complete catalogue of the royal collections, but described only what he considered the rare and interesting specimens ( Fernholm and Wheeler 1983).
Hopefully more information about these collections will come to light and other specimens from the original type series can be identified and the origin of those described here can be more accurately identified.
No known copyright restrictions apply. See Agosti, D., Egloff, W., 2009. Taxonomic information exchange and copyright: the Plazi approach. BMC Research Notes 2009, 2:53 for further explanation.
