Author citation (botany)


In botanical nomenclature, author citation refers to citing the person or group of people who validly published a botanical name, i.e. who first published the name while fulfilling the formal requirements as specified by the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants. In cases where a species is no longer in its original generic placement, both the authority for the original genus placement and that for the new combination are given.
In botany, it is customary to abbreviate author names according to a recognised list of standard abbreviations.
There are differences between the botanical code and the normal practice in zoology. In zoology, the publication year is given following the author names and the authorship of a new combination is normally omitted. A small number of more specialized practices also vary between the recommendations of the botanical and zoological codes.

Introduction

In biological works, particularly those dealing with taxonomy and nomenclature but also in ecological surveys, it has long been the custom that full citations to the place where a scientific name was published are omitted, but a short-hand is used to cite the author of the name, at least the first time this is mentioned. The author name is frequently not sufficient information, but can help to resolve some difficulties. Problems include:
Rules and recommendations for author citations in botany are covered by Articles 46–50 of the International Code of Nomenclature. As stated in Article 46 of the botanical Code, in botany it is normal to cite only the author of the taxon name as indicated in the published work, even though this may differ from the stated authorship of the publication itself.

Basic citation

The simplest form of author citation in botany applies when the name is cited in its original rank and its original genus placement, where the original author are the only name/s cited, and no parentheses are included.
The Latin term "et" or the ampersand symbol "&" can be used when two authors jointly publish a name.Recommendation 46C.1
In many cases the author citation will consist of two parts, the first in parentheses, e.g.:
This form of author citation indicates that the epithet was originally published in another genus by the first author, Dominique Villars, but moved to the present genus Helianthemum by the second author. Alternatively, the revising author changed the rank of the taxon, for example raising it from subspecies to species, from subgenus to Section, etc.Article 49.

Abbreviation

When citing a botanical name including its author, the author's name is often abbreviated. To encourage consistency, the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants ICN recommendsRecommendation 46A, Note 1 the use of Brummitt & Powell's Authors of Plant Names, where each author of a botanical name has been assigned a unique abbreviation. These standard abbreviations can be found at the International Plant Names Index.
For example, in:
the abbreviation "L." refers to the famous botanist Carl Linnaeus who described this genus on p. 492 of his Species Plantarum in 1753.
the abbreviation "Cham." refers to the botanist Adelbert von Chamisso and "Schldl." to the botanist Diederich Franz Leonhard von Schlechtendal; these authors jointly described this species in 1827.

Usage of the term "ex"

When "ex" is a component of the author citation, it denotes the fact that an initial description did not satisfy the rules for valid publication, but that the same name was subsequently validly published by a second author or authors.Article 46.4 However, if the subsequent author makes clear that the description was due to the earlier author, then no "ex" is used, and the earlier author is listed alone. For example:
indicates that Josef Schultes validly published this name, but his description was based on an earlier description by Franz Sieber.

Examples

The following forms of citation are all equally correct:
As indicated above, either the original or the revising author may involve multiple words, as per the following examples from the same genus:
The ancillary term "in" is sometimes employed to indicate that the authorship of the published work is different from that of the name itself, for example:
Article 46.2 Note 1 of the Botanical Code indicates that in such cases, the portion commencing "in" is in fact a bibliographic citation and should not be used without the place of publication being included, thus the preferred form of the name+author alone in this example would be Verrucaria aethiobola Wahlenb., not Verrucaria aethiobola Wahlenb. in Acharius.

Authorship of subsidiary ranks

According to the botanical Code it is only necessary to cite the author for the lowest rank of the taxon in question, i.e. for the example subspecies given above it is not necessary to cite the authority of the species as well as that of the subspecies, though this is found in some sources. The only exception to this rule is where the nominate variety or subspecies of a species is cited, which automatically will inherit the same authorship of its parent taxon,Article 26.1 thus:
As described in Article 47 of the botanical code, on occasion either the diagnostic characters or the circumscription of a taxon may be altered sufficiently that the attribution of the name to the original taxonomic concept as named is insufficient. The original authorship attribution is not altered in these cases, but a taxonomic statement can be appended to the original authorship using the abbreviation "emend.", as per these examples given in the Code:
.

Other indications

Other indications which may be encountered appended to scientific name authorship include indications of nomenclatural or taxonomic status, prior taxonomic status for taxa transferred between hybrid and non-hybrid status " and ", and more. Technically these do not form part of the author citation but represent supplementary text, however they are sometimes included in "authority" fields in less well constructed taxonomic databases. Some specific examples given in Recommendations 50A–F of the botanical Code include:
for a taxon name published without an acceptable description or diagnosis
for a homonym—indicating in this instance that Carl Peter Thunberg's "Lindera" is not the same taxon as that named previously by Michel Adanson, the correspondence of the two names being coincidental
as above, but two prior homonyms noted, the first by Ludwig Reichenbach, the second by Ferdinand von Mueller
for a taxon name rejected and placed on the list of rejected names forming an appendix to the botanical Code
this is the preferred syntax for a name that has been misapplied by a subsequent author or authors such that it actually represents a different taxon from the one to which Vahl's name correctly applies
indicating that the epithet as originally published was spelled solomonensis, but the spelling here is in an altered form, presumably for Code compliance or some other legitimate reason.