Ixos xanthopygos Hemprich & Ehrenberg

Mlíkovský, Jiří & Frahnert, Sylke, 2011, Type specimens and type localities of birds collected during the Hemprich and Ehrenberg expedition to Lebanon in 1824, Zootaxa 2990, pp. 1-29 : 15-16

Ixos xanthopygos Hemprich & Ehrenberg

Ixos xanthopygos Hemprich & Ehrenberg, 1833: 54 .

Now. Pycnonotus xanthopygos ( Hemprich & Ehrenberg, 1833) . See Hartert (1907: 461).

Type series. Hemprich and Ehrenberg (1833: 54) explicitly based this form on a series of 19 specimens, including males, females and juveniles (“Marem, Feminam et pullos novimus. Specimina 19.”), from “Arabia”. Unfortunately, their paper includes some contradictions which make the identification of type specimens difficult: (1) They listed (p. 54) the species also among birds from “ Syria ” [= northern Lebanon]. (2) They stated (p. 54) that they did not record the species from Africa (“in Africa nusquam visus”), but later (p. 57) they listed the species among the birds they collected “in Nubia et Dongala”. (3) They stated that they based this form on 19 specimens, which corresponds with 19 specimens of Turdus caudalis received in Berlin with the 8th shipment ( Lichtenstein 1824, Nr. 45–49 and 124–137). However, the 9th shipment included six additional specimens of Turdus arabicus (Hemprich’s name) = Turdus xanthopygos (Lichtenstein’s name), the origin of which was originally given as “Arabien”, which was struck out and replaced with “ Syria ” by Lichtenstein (1825, Nr. 29–34). Uncertainties in specimen numbers and origin currently make exact definition of the type series impossible.

Five specimens of Turdus (Pycnonotus) xanthopygus N. were registered in the Inventory Catalogue of the ZMB. Their origin was given as “Arabien” ( ZMB 3749–3751), “Arabien merid.” ( ZMB 3752) and “Arabien” sept.” (ZBM 3753), respectively. Lichtenstein (1854: 27) listed six specimens of Pyconotus xanthopygos from “Arab[ia]” and “Mozamb[ique]”. Dresser and Blanford (1874: 340) found in ZMB in September 1873 “three old and one young bird from Arabia”.

Mauersberger (1987: 170) found in ZMB only two specimens, but we have found three. All of the five specimens registered in the Inventory Catalogue of the ZMB probably belonged to the type series of I. xanthopygos , although direct proof for this is not available. (The two lost specimens from “Arabia” are not listed below.)

Lectotype (designated by Mauersberger 1987: 170): ZMB 3749, skin, unsexed. The type locality was originally given as “Arabia” in the Inventory Catalogue of the ZMB, but the specimen was later labeled as coming from “ Syria ”, which statement was subsequently corrected to “Arabien”.

Paralectotype: ZMB 3750, mount, adult, collected in “Arabien” (label).

Paralectotype: ZMB 3752, mount, collected in “Arabien” (label).

Paralectotype (lost): ZMB 3751, collected in “Arabien” (Inventory Catalogue of the ZMB).

Paralectotype (lost): ZMB 3753, juv., collected in “Arabien” sept.” (Inventory Catalogue of the ZMB).

Type locality. Originally, the type locality included “ Syria ” [= northern Lebanon], “Arabia septentrionalis” [= Sinai Peninsula, Egypt], and “Arabia” meridionalis ” [=Al Muwaylih, Saudi Arabia; 27.68°N, 35.47°E]. Hartert (1907: 461) restricted the locality to “ Syria ” without designating a lectotype (see also Zedlitz 1912: 546, Vaurie 1959b: 189). Bates (1935) changed the type locality to “Muwailah” on the Arabian coast near the north end of the Red Sea [= Al Muwaylih, Saudi Arabia] on the basis of Stresemann’s information (in litt.) that “all of Hemprich and Ehrenberg’s specimens of Pycnonotus xanthopygos (five in all) have been collected in Arabia, and none in Syria ” (see also Rand & Deignan 1960: 239). Mauersberger (1987: 169–170) reasoned that Stresemann’s information regarded only the five specimens listed in the Inventory Catalogue of the ZMB, not all syntypes. Mauersberger (1987: 170) then designated specimen ZMB 3749 as the lectotype of this species, automatically restricting its type locality to the place, where the lectotype was collected, and invalidating Bates’s (1935) restriction of the type locality ( ICZN 1999, Art. 76.2). Unfortunately, the geographic origin of the lectotype is not clear (see above). Pycnonotus bulbuls were sent to Berlin with the 8th and 9th shipments, i.e they were collected at localities visited by Hemprich and Ehrenberg between 23 July 1823 – 6 August 1824 ( Stresemann 1954: 171). Considering Hemprich and Ehrenberg’s routes in this period and the known distribution of White-eyed Bulbuls (e.g. Goodman & Meininger 1989, Fishpool & Tobias 2005), it is possible to conclude that the lectotype was collected in the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt, at Al Muwaylih, Saudi Arabia, or in northern Lebanon.