(2818) Proposal to conserve the name Ficus trigona (Moraceae) with a conserved type

Abstract

(2818) Ficus trigona L. f., Suppl. Pl.: 441. Apr 1782 [Angiosp.: Mor.], nom. cons. prop. Typus: Suriname, [C.G. Dahlberg] 159 in Herb. Linnaeus No. 1240.12 (LINN), typ. cons. prop. After reviewing their protologues and typification, we found that Ficus trigona L. f. (Suppl. Pl.: 441. 1782) should be considered a superfluous and illegitimate name because at the time of its publication it contained the single syntype of F. trigonata L. (Pl. Surin.: 17. 1775). Our recognition of F. trigona as a superfluous name was only noticed after the clarification of the original material of F. trigonata by Moraes (in Phytotaxa 41: 59. 2012). In this work the author demonstrated that the notation in the protologue of F. trigonata: “Ficus 159. Trigonata” (without collector and herbarium), refers to a collection of Dahlberg from Suriname in the Linnaean Herbarium (LINN No. 1240.12), where it is annotated “Ficus trigonata 159” by Linnaeus himself. The specimen is thus a syntype and part of the original material of F. trigonata together with the Plumier plate also cited (“Plum. Icon. t. 132, f. 1”) in the protologue. The plate (Plumier, Pl. Amer. 6: 123, t. 132, fig. 1. 1757), based on an individual from the Antilles, with its 3-word diagnosis “foliis ovatis, integerrimis” providing the sole basis for valid publication of the name, was the only element available for typification of F. trigonata (Art. 7.8, Art. 9 Note 3; Turland & al. in Regnum Veg. 158. 2018) and was later designated as lectotype by Berg & DeWolf (in Lanjouw & Stoffers, Fl. Suriname 5: 264. 1975). The protologue of Ficus trigona referenced the same Plumier plate as well as “Habitat in Surinamo. Dalberg”. Taking Art. 40 Note 2 as guidance, we can consider the latter statement as mention of a single specimen or gathering, that represented by the Dahlberg collection (LINN No. 1240.12) from Suriname and constituting the only syntype of F. trigonata. By including “all syntypes under Art. 9.6” (Art. 52.2(a)) of F. trigonata in his F. trigona, Linnaeus filius is considered to have “definitely included the type […] of a name that ought to have been adopted” (Art. 52.1), making F. trigona a superfluous, illegitimate name. Although the same authors (Berg & DeWolf, l.c.: 261) are indicated by Moraes (l.c.) as lectotypifying F. trigona on the Dahlberg collection (LINN No. 1240.12) from Suriname, this must be ignored, as under Art. 7.5 the name is a homotypic synonym of F. trigonata. It is not clear why Linnaeus filius published Ficus trigona on the same elements as F. trigonata, but the main suspicion would be that F. trigonata was not considered a properly published name. The following evidence corroborates this: (1) the protologue of F. trigonata has only the number 159 (Linnaeus's herbarium) and the reference to “Plum. Icon. t. 132, f. 1”, without a diagnosis or description; (2) the name F. trigonata was not mentioned in subsequent publications, only F. trigona (e.g., Thunberg, Ficus: 5, 10. 1786; Lamarck, Encycl. 2: 497. 1788; Vahl, Enum. Pl. 2: 190. 1805; Miquel in London J. Bot. 6: 548. 1847 [‘Urostigma’]), until the name was recovered by Grisebach (Fl. Brit. W.I.: 150–151. 1859); (3) the epithets of F. trigonata and F. trigona have the same meaning: triangular shape; (4) Linnaeus filius also published another new species, F. pertusa L. f. (l.c.: 442), based on the same elements as an earlier name of Linnaeus (father), F. perforata L. (l.c.: 17; a name proposed for rejection by Berg in Taxon 52: 369–370. 2003), just as Linnaeus filius did in F. trigona. However the history of these names followed different ways that applied them to distinct, easily recognized, and well-circumscribed species. Ficus trigonata was applied to a species that occurs in Central America, the Antilles and northern South America (Berg & DeWolf, l.c.: 264; Berg & Villavicencio in Ilicifolia 5: 30–31, 64–65, 91–92, 112. 2004). This species has an ostiole surrounded by a distinct rim as its main characteristic and has been recognized in the literature for more than 150 years (Grisebach, l.c.; DeWolf in Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 47: 156–157. 1960; Berg & DeWolf, l.c.; Burger in Fieldiana, Bot. 40: 176–177. 1977; Berg & al. in Acta Amazon. 14: 179. 1986; Carauta in Albertoa 2: 165–170. 1989; Berg in Gorts-Van Rijn, Fl. Guianas 11: 55–56. 1992; Berg & Villavicencio, l.c.). Ficus trigona has been applied to a species distributed from Colombia to Brazil, and the main characteristic of this species is the ostiole surrounded by a trilobed ring (Berg & DeWolf, l.c.: 261–264; Pederneiras & al. in Brittonia 72: 227–228. 2020). This name has been mentioned in the literature for more than 200 years (Thunberg, l.c.; Lamarck, l.c.; Vahl, l.c.; Miquel, l.c. [‘Urostigma’]; Berg & DeWolf, l.c.: 261; Berg & al., l.c.; Carauta, l.c.; Berg, l.c. 1992; Berg & Simonis in Riina, Fl. Venez. Moraceae: 179–181. 2000; Berg & Villavicencio, l.c.; Berg in Harling & Persson, Fl. Ecuador 85: 114–117. 2009; Pederneiras & al., l.c.). The loss of the name Ficus trigona would thus be a disadvantageous nomenclatural change. To avoid such a change due to the strict application of the Code, we propose here the conservation of F. trigona with LINN No. 1240.12 as a conserved type, matching the same concept that has been applied to this name for more than 200 years. LCP, https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1822-227X SRN, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2759-3008 VFM, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7204-0744 The authors thank Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ, E-26/202.277/2019, E-26/202.278/2019) for funding this research. We thank Mark Spencer, Natural History Museum, London, for sending Ficus information, and John H. Wiersema, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, for the careful review of this work.