A Review of the Genus Eunice - Smithsonian Institution Libraries

NUMBER 523 155
branchiae is rare in the genus, and unique to the species listed
in Table 37.
Eunice gaimardi Quatrefages, 1866
Eunice gaimardi Quatrefages, 1866:321.—Fauchald, 1986:251.
REMARKS.—The information available about this species
was reviewed by Fauchald (1986). The species is indeterminable
without access to the type material.
Eunice gallica (Lamarck, 1818)
Leodice gallica Lamarck, 1818:322.—Savigny, 1820:50-51.
Eunice tail tea — Auduuin and Milne Edwards, 1833:218; 1834:144.
REMARKS.—Lamarck gave a brief Latin diagnosis and an
even briefer comment in French. The combined information is
summarized in the next paragraph.
Specimen with 71 segments. Antennae without articulations.
Branchiae first present from segment 6 [setiger 4, K. Fauchald
comment]. Anterior branchiae single filaments; other branchiae
bifid. Branchiae missing on last 18 setigers.
Savigny added that the antennae were shorter than in E.
antennata and lacked articulations and that branchiae in
segments 6-8 were simple filaments, that the branchiae of
segment 9 had two filaments, and that branchiae were missing
in the last 18 segments of a total of 72 segments.
Audouin and Milne Edwards (1834) stated that they had not
seen any material, that the species resembles E. harassii, except
for the absence of articulations from the ceratostyles, and that
the branchiae started on segment 6. They otherwise quoted
Savigny's description in toto.
No specimens are known and no type locality other than
what is implied by the species name is known. The species is
here considered indeterminable, in agreement with Hartman
(1959).
Eunice gigantea auctores
REMARKS.—This specific name has been used several times,
in a variety of contexts. The specimens to which the different
versions of the name were originally applied are no longer in
existence, and the name, in all its many guises, is invalid. Part
of the discussion has referred to the designation of type species
for the genus; this aspect was reviewed above. However, a brief
review of the various uses of this name may clarify some of the
confusion at the species level.
1. Nereis gigantea Linnaeus, 1758:654. The total description
is the following line:
Nereis teniaculorum fasciculis triplici online.
As a synonym for this species, Linnaeus lists Millepora
marina amboinensi and as habitat "Mare Indico." The
information in the Linnean description is clearly inadequate to
identify the taxon even to family.
2. "Eunice gigantea Cuvier" sensu auctores. According to
Savigny (1820:49-50), Cuvier used this name for specimens in
the collections in Paris and published in Cuvier (1817:525).
Cuvier (1817:525) named the genus Eunice, but no species
named gigantea was mentioned. He listed aphroditois, pinnata,
norwegica, tubicola, and cuprea as members of his new genus
and stated that he "had seen a giant specimen [of Eunice]" from
the Indian Ocean. That informal mention may have been the
source of the reference by later authors. Lamarck (1818:322)
made no reference to a species named gigantea authored by
Cuvier. In a later edition, Cuvier (1830:200) included gigantea
in a list of synonyms similar to the one issued by Savigny
(1820). Cuvier (1830) reviewed material from both the Indian
and Atlantic oceans.
3. Leodice gigantea Lamarck, 1818. Lamarck (1818:322)
gave a brief Latin diagnosis of the species and a rather
extensive description in French. His description is an excerpt of
the one published by Savigny two years later and clearly refers
to the same specimens.
4. Leodice gigantea.—Savigny, 1820:49-50. Savigny
listed Nereis aphroditois Pallas (= Terebella aphroditois, sensu
Gmelin) as a possible synonym for his new species (which
actually had been published already by Lamarck). The quote
reads "Varie*te d'age ou espece tres-voisine." In addition,
Savigny quoted the museum collections and gave reference to
Cuvier as listed above. The material studied by Savigny was
from the Indian Ocean and the fairly detailed description is
consistent with Eunice aphroditois (Pallas). Because the latter
name is valid (see above), in this sense the name is a junior
synonym of E. aphroditois.
5. Quatrefages (1866:311) reserved the name gigantea for
material from the Indian Ocean. He gave a new name, Eunice
roussaei, to Atlantic specimens, including some he had
collected; as a synonym for this species he quoted "Eunice
gigantea Cuvier Regne anim. L III, p. 200." This reference is to
the second edition of Cuvier's book, issued in 1833, where the
species occurs on the page indicated and where Cuvier included
specimens from both the Atlantic and Indian oceans. Quatrefages
is correct in separating the Atlantic species from the
Indian Ocean species; thus he was also correct in giving the
Atlantic material a new name. As the original author for the
name gigantea, Quatrefages quoted Nereis gigantea Linnaeus
with no date. As indicated above, the Linnaean species, as
originally described in 1758, is wholly unidentifiable, even to
family. In summary, where identifiable, the name gigantea in
combination with the generic names Eunice or Leodice used
about material from the Indian Ocean refers to the species
validly named E. aphroditois (Pallas). The Linnaean name
Nereis gigantea cannot be identified even to family. Cuvier did
not use the name E. gigantea in the 1817 edition of his "Regne
animal"; he used it first in 1833; thus Lamarck (1818) first used
the name Leodice gigantea and in his sense the name can be
identified as a junior synonym of Pallas' Nereis aphroditois.