Amber Listserv / amber holotypes

[Hans Henderickx]

Let me give an example.

On this picture you see the holotype of the Baltic amber scorpion  Palaeospinobuthus cenozoicus that I described some years ago. There is only one specimen known until now, this one.

I bought it for a reasonable price, but still quite some money. We worked several years on the description, than the referees would not accept our manuscript with the original description unless the specimen was deposited in a museum with a registration number, accessable for the public.
There were two possibilities: throw all research in the thrash can or deposit the specimen in a museum and have the manuscript approved.
 
I choose the second solution. After all it was only a pendant. It is registered in a museum now, as indicated in the publication. For me, the 'money' value is vanished, and the museum cannot sell it either.

The deposition in musea is not obligated by the code, just recommended. But a lot of editors consider it as a 'must' to have a registration number before the manuscript is approved. Other magazines or editors are not that strict, it is very well possible to have holotypes registered in your personal collection at home (f.i. Cerambicidae,  Francesco Vitali personal communication) but even than the registration in the publication points to your specific collection, and it should stay there. A such holotype should never be sold to disappearance!
So what is the value than? Priceless, exact.

Please don't mix up with 'undescribed unique' specimens. So called 'new species' that have not been described yet should pass from hand to hand, until somebody occupies studying them. But at the time the manuscript is ready for approval, the problem of holotype deposition will be there.

Hans
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