Melanopsis buccinoidea Olivier, 1801

Melanopsis buccinoidea Olivier, 1801 View in CoL (clade A)

Olivier (1801: 297, pl. 17, fig. 8.) described Melanopsis buccinoidea (for the original description see the Supporting Information, File S1), as ‘living in the fresh waters of Scio [Khios], from almost all the islands of the Archipelago, Crete, Syria’. He described the shell as conical in shape, smooth and dark, with eight whorls, with the body whorl a little higher than all the others together, the mouth oval oblong, the lip thin, without sinuosities and the columellar callus white. Our gastropods from Chios Island fit all the character states listed above in the description, thus it could be safely said that M. buccinoidea occurs on Chios and Lesbos. However, molecularly it is distinct from the other clades, especially from the clades in the Levant. In the collection of Olivier deposited in the MNHN in Paris, there are ten shells that may represent M. buccinoidea ( Olivier, 1801) , as possible syntypes. However, they are labelled ‘ M. praemorsa L., Tripoli, M. Olivier, 1803’ ( Tillier & Mordan, 1983), which makes their status as syntypes doubtful. It has to be noted that in the original description (see above), the coasts of Syria are mentioned, but not specifically Tripoli; Tripoli is mentioned by de Férussac (1822), but it is uncertain whether he obtained his sample from Olivier ( Tillier & Mordan, 1983). Species determination of these empty shells of Melanopsis is impossible, and nothing suggests that those specimens were determined as M. buccinoidea by Olivier. Thus, the syntypes appear to be either lost or ambiguously identified as such.

According to the ICZN (1999: Article 73.1.4), there is a possibility of interpretation of Olivier’s drawing as the holotype, although this was not stated explicitly. In the beginning of the nineteenth century there was no custom of designating a holotype, but one could expect that Olivier (1801) illustrated a ‘most typical’ specimen. The type locality, according to the ICZN (1999: Article 76A.1.4), may be restricted to Khios Island. There is no information about any geographical variation in the description.

Thus, a solution is to designate a neotype (according to the ICZN, 1999: Article 75.3), to clarify the taxonomic status and type locality of a nominal taxon.

Designation of the neotype of Melanopsis buccinoidea Olivier, 1801

The neotype has a shell ( Figs 2I–J View Figure 2 ) broadly conical in shape, smooth and dark, with growth lines hardly marked, with flat whorls and hardly visible sutures, and six whorls, with the apex corroded. The body whorl is higher than all the others together, the mouth is oval oblong, with sharp outer margins (without the lip), without sinuosities, and the columellar callus is white.

Neotype measurements: Shell height 13.50 mm, shell breadth 7.24 mm, body whorl height 11.61 mm, aperture height 6.53 mm, aperture breadth 4.39 mm. The neotype is defined by its sequence of cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI), of 1N7 extraction number, GenBank number: MN711507 View Materials .

Type locality: Nagos, Khios Island, Greece, 38°33’29’N; 26°04’50’E. It is deposited in the Museum of Natural History of the University of Wroclaw, Poland, signature: MNHW-1343.