University College London

Mike Taylor

As we all know, the [International Code of Zoological
Nomenclature](http://www.nhm.ac.uk/hosted-sites/iczn/code/) is a large
and intimidating document.  As a result, zoologists naming new animals
often do not read it in its entirety (I know I haven't).  It's probably
because of this that many of the more avoidable nomenclatural mistakes
occur.

Whatever might or might not eventually be possible in terms of
simplifying the Code, everyone recognises that that would be a huge job,
and something that would take years to do.  So let's ignore that
possibility for now.

In the short term, what would be much more useful would be if someone
could work up a very short document --- no more than a single page of A4
and hopefully much shorter --- that states in simple bullet-points what
MUST be done to ensure that a new name is valid.  Then there would be no
excuse for zoologists venturing into nomenclature for the first time not
to read such a document --- let's call it the ICZN Cheat Sheet.

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image-caption="<p>Neural spine morphology along the vertebral series of Bonitasaurua salgadoi (MPCA-460) in anterior view.  From Gallina 2011, doi:10.1590/S0001-37652011005000001</p>
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Neural spine morphology along the vertebral series of Bonitasaurua
salgadoi (MPCA-460) in anterior view. From Gallina 2011,
doi:10.1590/S0001-37652011005000001
:::

Because it's easier to steer a moving ship, I wrote to the ICZN email
list this morning proposing an initial set of bullet points.  I did not
for a moment expect that they were complete, consistent or even
necessarily correct; but I hoped that they could at least serve as a
starting point for a very quick process of putting such a list together.

I am pleased to say that response on the list was fairly positive, and
at the suggestion of one of the list members I have now posted the
in-progress checklist as [a page on this
site](http://svpow.wordpress.com/checklist-for-new-zoological-genus-and-species-names-draft/ "Checklist for new zoological genus and species names [DRAFT]"),
having revised it in accordance with several suggestions.

If you're interested in contributing to this effort --- helping us to
derive a clear, concise and correct one-page guide to naming new
zoological genera and species --- please [head over to the
page](http://svpow.wordpress.com/checklist-for-new-zoological-genus-and-species-names-draft/ "Checklist for new zoological genus and species names [DRAFT]")
and comment there.  (Comments on this post are closed, to avoid
splitting discussion across two places.)


As we all know, the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature is a large and intimidating document.  As a result, zoologists naming new animals often do not read it in its entirety (I know I haven’t).  It’s probably because of this that many of the more avoidable nomenclatural mistakes occur.

Messaggi di Rogue Scholar

Naming new animals: towards a cheat-sheet