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Australian Journal of
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Taxon name
Notospermus Huschke, 1830
Figure citations
Registration Number
urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:53607F68-5011-43B1-A817-EBEF8FDE495B
Type statement
Type species: Notospermus drepanensis Huschke, 1830, fixed by monotypy.
Synonymy
Ophiocephalus Quoy & Gaimard in Blainville, 1828: 574, syn. nov., nom. oblit.
Notospermus Huschke, 1830: 681, nom. prot.
Notogymnus Ehrenberg, 1831: 66.
Diagnosis
Given in Riser (1991).
Description
Specimens Examined
Notes
Remarks. When Blainville (1828: 574) introduced Ophiocephalus, he attributed its authorship to Quoy & Gaimard. According to Recommendation 51E of the Code (ICZN 1999), the name should be cited as "Ophiocephalus Quoy & Gaimard in Blainville, 1828", rather than "Ophiocephalus Blainville, 1828" (e.g., Gibson 1995: 451).
Notospermus Huschke, 1830 and Ophiocephalus Quoy & Gaimard in Blainville, 1828—along with five other genera—were synonymized with Lineus Sowerby, 1805 by Bürger (1904: 88). Then, Notospermus remained invalid for 87 years. When it was re-validated by Riser (1991), who transferred O. tricuspidata to it, Ophiocephalus was not mentioned. So far as I am aware, the senior synonym Ophiocephalus Quoy & Gaimard in Blainville, 1828 has not been used as valid after 1899, satisfying the condition stipulated in Article 23.9.1.1 of the Code (ICZN 1999). The name Ophiocephalus has been frequently used for more than a century (e.g., Starks 1911; Yang et al. 2026) for snakeheads in the freshwater perciform family Channidae. However, Ophiocephalus is a subsequent incorrect spelling of Ophicephalus Bloch, 1793. Moreover, Ophicephalus Bloch, 1793 has been synonymized with Channa Scopoli, 1777 by Myers & Shapovalov (1932) (Haniffa et al. 2013).
The junior synonym Notospermus is currently in prevailing usage, having been used as valid at least in the following 31 works (at least 25 required) by 24 first authors (at least 10 authors required) encompassing a span of 35 years (not less than 10 years required) in the immediately preceding 50 years (since 1976): Riser (1991), Senz (1994), Gibson & Sundberg (2002), Thollesson & Norenburg (2003), Chen et al. (2009), Herrera-Bachiller et al. (2015), Kvist et al. (2015), Chernyshev (2016, 2025), Kajihara et al. (2016, 2022), Kajihara (2017, 2021), Lipej et al. (2017), Jiang & Deng (2018), Luo et al. (2018), Hookabe et al. (2019), Inoue & Satoh (2019), Hoffman & Kajihara (2020, 2023), Hookabe & Kajihara (2020a, b), Martin et al. (2020), Sun et al. (2021), Kahrić et al. (2022), Saadi et al. (2023), Santovito et al. (2023), Andrikou et al. (2025), Marturano et al. (2025), Maslakova et al. (2025), and Abato et al. (2026). It thus satisfies the conditions stipulated in Article 23.9.1.2 of the Code (ICZN 1999). Under Article 23.9.2 of the Code (1999), Notospermus Huschke, 1830 is here declared a nomen protectum with respect to Ophiocephalus Quoy & Gaimard in Blainville, 1828, a nomen oblitum.
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