Zosterops palpebrosa elwesi Baker, 1922

Mary, 2011, Type Specimens Of Birds In The American Museum Of Natural History Part 9. Passeriformes: Zosteropidae And Meliphagidae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2011 (348), pp. 1-193 : 7

Zosterops palpebrosa elwesi Baker

Zosterops palpebrosa elwesi Baker, 1922: 144 (Sikkim) .

Now Zosterops palpebrosus palpebrosus (Temminck, 1824) . See Mees, 1957: 53–60, Dickinson, 2003: 625, and van Balen, 2008: 446–447.

LECTOTYPE: AMNH 699939 , unsexed, collected in Sikkim, India, in 1876. From the H.J. Elwes Collection via the Rothschild Collection.

COMMENTS: In the original description, Baker listed as type an unsexed specimen collected in Sikkim in 1876 from the Elwes Collection and held in the Rothschild Collection. Two specimens with the above data came to AMNH with the Rothschild Collection. AMNH 699939 is marked ‘‘Zost. palp. elwesi Baker Type’’ and bears a Rothschild type label. Hartert’s (1928: 208) listing of the type does not differentiate between the two specimens, although he incorrectly listed the type as a male and undated (both specimens are unsexed and dated 1876). Because the specimen marked ‘‘Type’’ and bearing the Rothschild type label was the intended type of elwesi and was so cataloged when the Rothschild collection came to AMNH, I hereby designate AMNH 699939 the lectotype of Z. p. elwesi to remove any ambiguity. AMNH 699940 becomes the paralectotype. Even though the type was said to be in the Rothschild Collection, Mees (1957: 58) apparently only searched for it in BMNH.