Arrhopalites

Vargovitsh, Robert S., 2009, New Cave Arrhopalitidae (Collembola: Symphypleona) from the Crimea (Ukraine), Zootaxa 2047, pp. 1-47 : 5-6

Nomenclature of Arrhopalites

Genus Arrhopalites was created by Börner (1906: 182) with type species Sminthurus caecus Tullberg, 1871 . Inside the genus Stach (1945) suggested two groups of species: caecus -group and pygmaeus -group. Genus Pseudarrhopalites Stach, 1945 created for Arrhopalites diversus Mills, 1934 was synonymized with Arrhopalites ( Christiansen 1966: 59) .

For the caecus -group of species Yosii (1954: 68) erected subgenus Coecarrhopalites .

Gisin (1960: 270) regarded Coecarrhopalites Yosii, 1954 as a synonym of Arrhopalites Börner, 1906 : “ungultig weil ohne Typus ” = invalid as without type species.

As can be read in Yosii (1967: 66) “ Coecarrhopalites Yosii, 1953 (should be 1954) has been established as a subgenus of Arrhopalites . Later on Delamare et Massoud (1963) have regarded it an independent genus. The genotypical species must be Sminthurus coecus Tullberg, 1871 ”. Apparently this should mean that Yosii admited generic status for Coecarrhopalites and that for two genera–– Arrhopalites and Coecarrhopalites the same type species was chosen.

Gough (1973: 208) supported synonymy of Coecarrhopalites : “In Gisin (1960) Coecarrhopalites is treated as a synonym of Arrhopalites Börner … This is correct because Börner named A. caecus as the type species of Arrhopalites and Yosii, 1954 … chose the same species as the type of Coecarrhopalites . By the rules of nomenclature… Coecarrhopalites immediately becomes a junior synonym of Arrhopalites ”.

Ellis and Bellinger (1973: 13) defined name “ Coecarrhopalites Yosii, 1967 ” as a “junior objective synonym of Arrhopalites Börner, 1906 ” and therefore not an available name.

Stebaeva (1988: 188), Christiansen and Bellinger (1998: 1229), and Bretfeld (1999: 62) also regard Coecarrhopalites Yosii, 1967 as synonym of Arrhopalites .

From above citations it comes that statements of Gisin (1960) and Gough (1973) are not precisely accurate, as they synonymize subgeneric name Coecarrhopalites Yosii, 1954 of genus Arrhopalites with generic name Arrhopalites . Meanwhile Coecarrhopalites became a generic name only in 1967, thus the correct synonymization should be that of Ellis and Bellinger (1973).