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Who´s commemorated in Caprimulgus fossii ? (1 Viewer)

mb1848 said:
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Hellmayr describes this article as Aufzählung von 7 sp. aus Baloue an der Elfenbeinküste in West-Afrika.
I think this is Maurice de la Fosse from Ivory Coast and he is too young for 1857.
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Same guy mentioned here and here.

Maurice Delafosse (1870-1926) was not even born in 1857. Maybe description of Agama bibroni Duméril A or Ocneridia volxemii (Bolívar, 1878) gives us more info about Beziers La Fosse (Lieutenant) mentioned here:

mb1848 said:
I was wondering about a Lieutenant La Fosse who sent some things from Morocco to Paris.
https://science.mnhn.fr/all/list?recordedBy=Fosse .
Morocco is a long way from Senegal but?
We have looked at bird names where the name was created by cutting off the La or de or de la or von etc.
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"Maybe description of Agama bibroni Duméril A or Ocneridia volxemii (Bolívar, 1878) gives us more info about Beziers La Fosse (Lieutenant) " I looked in both and found nothingg fosse
 
Taphrospilus said:
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Hartlaub visited the Museum in Paris (as I understood) and found the bird there.
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Taphrospilus said:
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Verreaux also was in close connection with the MNHN.
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Cleere, N., C. Voisin & J.-F. Voisin. 2006. Liste des types d’oiseaux des collections du Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle de Paris. 15 : Podarges, Ibijaux et Engoulevents (Podargidae, Nyctibiidae et Caprimulgidae). Zoosystema 28 (1): 157-163. (here) ... doesn´t list any specimen of [Caprimulgus] "Fossii", and if not there, I (still, as in post #1) assume the two types ended up in Bremen, Germany. And as such they could have been destroyed, as parts of the Museum was devastated during WW2, badly hit by a bomb in December 1943.

If the two specimen of the "Fossii" Nightjar did "go up in smoke" is however unknown to me.
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Calalp said:
Cleere, N., C. Voisin & J.-F. Voisin. 2006. Liste des types d’oiseaux des collections du Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle de Paris. 15 : Podarges, Ibijaux et Engoulevents (Podargidae, Nyctibiidae et Caprimulgidae). Zoosystema 28 (1): 157-163. (here) ... doesn´t list any specimen of [Caprimulgus] "Fossii", and if not there, I (still, as in post #1) assume the two types ended up in Bremen, Germany. And as such it culd have been destroyed, as parts of the Museum was devastated during WW2, badly hit by a bomb in December 1943.
If the two specimen of the "Fossii" Nightjar did "go up in smoke" is however unknown to me.
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Hartlaub is explicit in the OD that there is a male and female "in Mus. Brem.". It may be that he saw other specimens in Paris (which would then be syntypes as well), but "the two types" are certainly the Bremen birds.
It looks like they are still there: see [here]. Unfortunately, they do not bear any original label. (The writing on the sticker at the bottom of the socle just indicates the specimens are from Gabon and were acquired from Verreaux, and lists synonyms from up to 1868, thus is definitely posterior to the description of C. fossii.)
 
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Thanks, Laurent! :t:

Nice to see the birds themselves!

To me this looks like those two birds were delivered/sold, by Jules Verreaux, to the Museum in Bremen in 1856 (described by Hartlaub, in 1857), but nothing indicating when they were collected! It could be that the unknown Monsieur Fosse was in Gabon far earlier, or close to, pre- or in 1856. Who knows?

Björn

PS. Note that the second name on those two labels; "C. [Caprimulgus] Wellwitschi" ... is erroneously written, aimed at today's C. f. welwitschii by Barboza (du Bocage) 1867 (here). Thereby; no need/use, for anyone who maybe noticed it, to start looking for any Mr. Wellwitsch ... (like I did) ;)
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And as I wrote in # 20 Hartlaub visited Verreux and they exchanged there experience. From OD I assume Hartlaub used Verreauxs manuscript. Nothing is indicating that Verreaux received it from a collctor in Gabon named Fosse. Without clear evidence Verreaux may have received it as well from Gabriel Delafosse /de la Fosse or any other private collector (not necassary field collector) and/or honored a friend from the MNHN or elsewhere.

Here Lamprocolius ignitus may or may not be collected by a M. Fosse.

Note the Verreauxs published a couple of articles about birds from Gabon around the same time. See here, here, here, here, here and here.

I haven't checked in detail if they mentioned a M. Fosse. I am not that sure if Hartlaub really knew anything about Fosse as claimed here when he wrote:

Zu den ornithologisch-reichsten Gebieten Africa's zählt unstreitig das äquatoriale Gabon. Du Chaillu, Franquet, Aubry-Lecomte, Fosse, Gujon und Andere haben daselbst auf verhältnissmässig beschränktem Flächenraum an 400 Arten gesammelt.
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even if he mentioned him here again.

Das Vaterland dieser Art ist die Insel do Principe im Golf von Guinea, wo Weiss und Dohrn dieselbe sammelten. Nach Verreaux wäre L. ignitus von Gujon auf St. Thomé, von Fosse in Gabon angetroffen; aber diese Angaben bedürfen sehr der Bestätigung.
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Means information came from Verreaux ahe had some doubts about the substance of the information.
 
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Martin, note that Hartlaub (1861) in the entry for the Glossy-Starling "Lamprocolius ignitus" (your first link, in post #27), wrote it "Gabon: Fosse" versus/contra the first reference, back to his own Monographische Uebersicht der Glanzstaare ... (from 1859, here), which told/tells us: "Gabon, Verr." ..., to me indicating that Hartlaub, in the time between, had learned something new, supposedly that it was Fosse who´d delivered that bird to Verreaux.

Keep digging!

Björn

PS. The quote from Journal für Ornithologie (January 1861):
"Zu den ornithologisch-reichsten Gebieten Africa's zählt unstreitig das äquatoriale Gabon. Du Chaillu, Franquet, Aubry-Lecomte, Fosse, Gujon und Andere haben daselbst auf verhältnissmässig beschränktem Flächenraum an 400 Arten gesammelt."
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Easier to read, and understand (for us non-German), in The Ibis, (translated into English, here), October, same year.
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I am not that sure if this was just Harlaubs interpretation/assumption as we can find Paul Belloni Du Chaillu, Dr E. Franquet (here), Aubry-Lecomte (here and Jean Louis Geneviève Guyon (1794-1870) associated with Africa, but Fosse only by Hartlaub.
 
Oiseaux ou l'Afrique Tropicale, by George Bouet, Part 1, 1955 (here), all in French.

See p.86, where we find both "Verreaux, Fosse" ... telling us what?

Also compare with the different spellings of similar names on pp.17 and 21 (54).

If of any use?

Björn

PS. Part 2, from 1961; here.
 
The different spellings from the pages are already discussed here.

mb1848 said:
Liste des Oiseaux rapportes par M. Delafosse du Baloue: Bull. Mus. d'IIist. Nat. Paris III. 1897, 198—199.
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/27170#page/208/mode/1up .

Hellmayr describes this article as Aufzählung von 7 sp. aus Baloue an der Elfenbeinküste in West-Afrika.
I think this is Maurice de la Fosse from Ivory Coast and he is too young for 1857.
Click to expand...

And p.86 is not telling us that he was a collector. I will not exclude that he was but till now I am not 100 % convinced. Not many birds mentioned with his name on a label for a field collector.
 
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The mere numbers of specimens on labels doesn´t rule him out as a "field collector" (and who have ever claimed him as such? At least not in the sence that he´d was a professional one, a guy who made a living out of it). Remember that there are several, many birds "collected" in various countries/locations by various officials, persons stationed in different places, that have supplied various Museums with only a few specimens (or just a single bird), still earning them the proper title of collector.

In some cases they just bought them on the local Market!

But sure, I agree, in the case of Mr Fosse, it´s hard to tell either way.
 
Another quick return ...

Also consider Hartlaub's note/correction, in 1861 (here alt. here), regarding a specimen (the Holotype!?) of "Nisus toussenelii"*: "Auch Fosse sammelte diese schöne Art in Gabon. Ein prachtvolles ... in Britischen Museo." ... which lead us here: "Purchased of Verreaux".

To me it looks, more and more, like Monsieur/Mr Fosse truly did collect, in Gabon, for Maison Verreaux.

For what it´s worth!

Björn
_________________________________________________________________________________
*today's Red-chested Goshawk Accipiter toussenelii (Verreaux, J, Verreaux, E & Des Murs, 1855), here.
 
Another guess René Louis Émilien Léon Fossé d'Arcosse was
Engagé dans la marine
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. If he ever was in Gabon, I have no clue but would nearly exclude him from his Leonore record here.

I am wondering why he was not mentioned as collector by the Verreauxs and or de Murs in OD. It is always Hartlaub who want to tell us a story about a field collector. What if the maison Verreaux got it from a local collector (like Lafresnaye, des Murs etc) whose name was Fosse and he got the bird from Gabon? Hartlaub may or may not misinterpreted this fact. Very weak based on labels of specimen from that time.
 
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Paul Clapham said:
That would be "Roberts, 2016" though. If you're looking for a "Roberts" book from 2009 then this one fits the bill. Except that it's about Kruger Park and its surroundings, which makes a link to Gabon unlikely.

However on the plus side, it would have more than 266 pages. Google Books doesn't allow searching the book and it's not available from the libraries I have local access to, so if anybody else wants to look on page 266 of the book they're welcome to do so.
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H Chittenden, G Davies & I Weiersbye (2016, Roberts Bird Guide, 2nd edn: 286) give the etymology of fossii as: after W. Fosse, German collector in Gabon.
 
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Taphrospilus said:
Dr E. Franquet (here), Aubry-Lecomte
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To be more precise Charles Eugène Aubry-Lecomte (1821-1879) and Pierre-Eugène FRANQUET author of De la fièvre jaune and chirguien de la marine.

Nevertheless death of Aubry Lecomte is wrong here p. 381 of 638 22 April 1898 (Friday) - La Ferté-Bernard.

But far from solution to The Eponym Dictionary of Birds claim and above.
Square-tailed Nightjar Caprimulgus fossii Hartlaub, 1857 [Alt. Gabon/Mozambique Nightjar]
W. Fosse (DNF) collected in the area of Gabon. Nothing seems to be recorded about him.
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But never give up and give the question back to the esteemed audience (even with not much hope to get the solution). Still think Fossé d'Arcosse, René Louis Émilien Léon (1839-1899) Engagé dans la marine may an interesting candidate. But still the link to Gabon is missing.
 
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