On the Original Author and Year of Description of the Extinct Hyaenid Pachycrocuta brevirostris

The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature recommends providing the author and year of original description of any taxon, when first mentioned in a publication, which is useful for both taxonomic and nomenclatural reasons. Here we show that the authorship of the extinct hyaenid taxon Hyaena brevirostris, type species of the genus Pachycrocuta, has been incorrectly attributed to “Aymard, 1846” for more than a century on the basis of a publication that never existed. Our bibliographic research indicates that the first published work in which the name was employed—Gervais' (1848–1852) Zoologie et Paleontologie francaises, the part dealing with carnivorans being issued in 1850—fulfils the criteria of availability. Given that Gervais did not attribute the description to Aymard, but merely employed the latter's name in reference to a museum label/record (which does not constitute a valid indication), the correct name with authorship for this taxon is Pachycrocuta brevirostris (Gervais, 1850).