Article 7.11 of the Shenzhen Code (Turland & al. in Regnum Veg. 159. 2018) defines several criteria that must be satisfied for effective designation of a type for a name at or below the rank of genus in the absence of a holotype or original type. Two of these requirements stipulate that the typifying author must employ specific language to achieve this. They must include “the term ‘type’ (typus) or an equivalent” and, after 1 January 2001, they must include “the phrase ‘designated here’ (hic designatus) or an equivalent”. Both of these requirements allow “equivalent” terms or phrases to substitute for the stipulated word(s), and this can lead to differing interpretations as to what is, or is not, considered “equivalent”. By its definition, to be “equivalent” something must be (as a noun), or have the property of being (as an adjective), equal to something else in value, amount, function, meaning, etc. (Oxford Languages, https://www.google.com/search?as_epq=equivalent). This word is widely used elsewhere in the body of the Code, some 30 times under other Articles, in 24 instances (e.g. Art. 8.2: “equivalent preparation”; Art. 10.1: “full equivalent of its type”; also Art. 19.4: “equivalent to that type”; Art. 22.2: “equivalent to exclusion of the type”; Art. 52 Note 3: “equivalent to citation of the name itself”; Art. F.3 Note 2: “equivalent to original material”; Art. H.6.1: “equivalent to a condensed formula”; etc.) specifying what is to be considered equivalent in meaning or effect to something defined elsewhere in this or another Code. A single case (Art. 11.9: “equivalent rank”) is clear enough and requires no further comment. In four remaining cases, which, as in Art. 7.11, likewise stipulate that a specific term must be used, the Code provides further guidance on what the employed equivalent term should be (Art. 16 Note 1: “their equivalents in modern languages”; Art. 9.23 & 40.6: “its abbreviation, or its equivalent in a modern language”). This implies that to include a term equivalent to “type”, the term employed must either be an appropriate abbreviation or be linguistically equivalent, i.e. have the same meaning in another language. Its lack of linguistic equivalence may be the reason *Ex. 16 under Art. 7.11 (“‘standard species’ […] treated as equivalent to ‘type’”) became a voted Example. Under Art. 7.11, Ex. 12 suggests that only a “linguistic equivalent” can replace the phrase “designated here” in the last part of the Article. There are other English expressions, or their equivalents in other modern languages, that would seem to easily meet this criterion, such as “selected here”, “chosen here” or “established here”, which imply an active step having been taken by an author to designate a type in that place. But what about more passive phrases like “indicated here” or “delineated here”? As pointed out by Turland & al. (in Taxon 69: 626–627. 2020) the Code itself makes a distinction between a type designation and a type indication, the latter lacking the explicit nature of the former, so should these be equivalent phrases? And what about active phrases having slightly different meaning, such as “accepted here”, or in the case of a second- or later-step typification a phrase like “restricted here” or “narrowed here”, or when a previous typification was imprecise: “clarified here” or “detailed here”? Or phrases like “altered here”, “corrected here”, “modified here” or “superseded here” when the previous typification was ineffective or improper? Given the plausible acceptability of many alternative phrases that might not be considered equivalent to “designated here”, what seems to be necessary in order to determine if a type designation has been achieved on or after 1 January 2001 is the author's usage of some expression that will demonstrate their clear intent to carry out an act of typification in that place. This reflects the Rapporteurs’ comment (Greuter & Hawksworth in Taxon 48: 75. 1999) on the original proposal that it “would eliminate for the future the risk of ‘incidental type designations’ which has often caused difficulties in the past”. We therefore propose the following amendment: “7.11. For purposes of priority (Art. 9.19, 9.20, and 10.5), designation of a type is achieved only if the type is definitely accepted as such by the typifying author, if the type element is clearly indicated by direct citation including the term “type” (typus) or an equivalent, and, on or after 1 January 2001, if the typification statement includes the phrase “designated here” (hic designatus) or an equivalent a similar expression demonstrating the author's intent to designate a type there.”
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Aug 17, 2023
Alessandra Giovenco + 1
Open Access