Enhydrus Laporte, 1834

Gustafson, Grey T. & Miller, Kelly B., 2013, On the family- and genus-series nomina in Gyrinidae Latreille, 1810 (Coleoptera, Adephaga), Zootaxa 3731 (1), pp. 77-105 : 94-95

Enhydrus Laporte, 1834

The genus nomen Enhydrus has caused nomenclatural problems of homonymy with a sea snake and a hydrophilid generic nomina (Balfour-Browne 1945; Balfour-Browne & Brinck 1961; Brinck 1978). The genus was erected by Laporte (1834), who designated the type as Gyrinus sulcatus Wiedemann, 1821 . Balfour-Browne (1945) appears to be the first one to have noticed an issue with the nomen Enhydrus after reviewing Neave’s (1939) Nomenclator Zoologicus (Vol. 2: 234). Neave indicated that the nomen Enhydrus was twice pre-occupied, by Enhydrus Rafinesque, 1815 , a generic nomen of sea snake, and Enhydrus Dahl, 1823 , a generic nomen of hydrophilid. Balfour-Browne (1945) stated that Enhydrus used by Rafinesque (1815) was either an unnecessary emendation or an incorrect subsequent spelling of Enhydris Latreille (1801) . He also discovered the nomen Enhydrus Dahl, 1823 to be a part of a “price list” without any diagnosis or description of the genera listed, and, therefore, he believed it to be a nomen nudum (Balfour-Browne 1945). Balfour-Browne (1945) requested that Enhydrus Laporte, 1834 be included in the Commission’s Official List of Generic Names, but, if rejected, he indicated that the next available nomen was “ Epinectus (Eschcholtz) Aubé, 1838 ”, a junior objective synonym, basis of the subfamily nomen EPINECTINAE. Despite his proposal, he later decided that Epinectus should actually be considered a nomen nudum (Balfour-Browne 1945; Balfour-Browne & Brinck 1961; see the discussion of Epinectus for more details).

Guignot (1954), apparently without knowledge of Balfour-Browne’s treatment of the issue, proposed that the generic nomen be changed to Prothydrus . Guignot’s, (1954) proposal was largely ignored. Balfour-Browne & Brinck (1961) followed up on the issue of Enhydrus and presented a case in the Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature to officially deal with it. This proposal was: that Enhydrus Rafinesque, 1815 be officially considered an incorrect subsequent spelling of Enhydris Latreille, 1802 ; that Enhydrus Dahl, 1823 to be declared unavailable (for reasons discussed earlier in Balfour-Browne 1945); that Enhydrus MacLeay, 1825 be suppressed since MacLeay’s only species, E. pallens , had been in Helochares Mulsant, 1844 for 115 years; and finally that Enhydrus Castelnau, 1834 be placed on the Official List of Generic Names. The following 1964 official ruling by the ICZN resulted in Opinion 710 with (1) suppression of Dahls’ 1823 work and thus the nomen Enhydrus appearing there; (2) conservation of Enhydrus Laporte, 1834 by the plenary power; (3) suppression of Enhydrus MacLeay, 1825 ; (4) official acknowledgment of Enhydrus Rafinesque, 1815 as an incorrect subsequent spelling of Enhydris Latreille, 1802 ; and, finally, (5) suppression of the generic nomen Prothydrus and the family-series nomen PROTHYDRINAE Guignot, 1954.