Calotes megapogon (Squamata, Agamidae, Draconinae): nomenclatural and taxonomic ramifications of the naming of an undescribed species

Abstract

During a field expedition to New Guinea in 1828, Salomon Müller discovered a new agamid lizard that was described in his notebook and accompanied by an illustration. He named the species Calotes megapogon, but a formal description was never published. Duméril & Bibron (1837) listed the name as a synonym of Lophyrus dilophus (comb. nov. pro Tiaris dilophus Duméril & Bibron, 1836), and later Gray (1845) treated Tiaris megapogon as a valid species. Through Gray’s action, the name became nomenclaturally available according to Article 11.6.1 of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature. We rediscovered the type specimens of Calotes megapogon in the collection of the Naturalis Biodiversity Center and studied the unpublished notes from Müller as well as the illustration. By comparison with morphologically similar species, we conclude that Calotes megapogon Duméril & Bibron, 1837 constitutes a senior subjective synonym of both Hypsilurus auritus (Meyer, 1874) and Hypsilurus spinosus (Duméril & Bibron, 1851), and that the name Hypsilurus megapogon (Duméril & Bibron, 1837) needs to be applied to this biological species.