Also, note use of leucocephalus vs cristatus...
Now, this looks like a real can of worms...
Buteo cristatus Louis J. P. Vieillot, 1816 (Dec.). Nouveau dictionnaire d'histoire naturelle, appliquée aux arts, à l'agriculture, à l'économie rurale et domestique, à la médecine, etc. Tome IV, p. 481.
Richmond Index card (Zoonomen) :
http://www.zoonomen.net/cit/RI/SP/Burn/burn00107a.jpg
Full text :
http://www.archive.org/details/nouveaudictionna04metc
This name is senior to
Pandion leucocephalus Gould, 1838.
Vieillot's text reads:
"La BUSE-BONDRÉE HUPPÉE,
Buteo cristatus, Vieill., a la tête blanche et brune; une huppe pendante et partant de l'occiput; toutes les plumes du dessus du corps brunes et bordées de roux; le dessous blanc avec des taches brunes sur le devant du cou, mais effacées sur la poitrine; les pennes primaires des ailes, noires; celles de la queue brunes en dessus et blanchâtres en dessous; une bande noire à travers l'oeil et descendant sur les côtés de la gorge; le bec et les ongles noirs; la cire et les pieds jaunes; la taille un peu plus forte que celle de notre balbuzard. On la trouve à la Nouvelle-Hollande."
This description might at first sight fit an osprey - the bird is crested, mainly white below and brown above, and it has a black band through the eye that runs down to the neck sides.
But the described bird also has yellow cere and feet, which would be abnormal for any osprey; it has rufous margins to all of its upperpart feathers, which is surprising as well; it has brown markings on the foreneck, becoming diffuse on the breast, while ospreys have a white foreneck and are marked with brown on the breast only; and it is said to be larger than "our osprey" (presumably in reference to European birds), while Australasian Ospreys are smaller. This bird was also unambiguously placed by Vieillot among buzzards (ospreys were described in another volume of the work), in a separate section along with the Western Honey-buzzard, under a title (p. 479) implying that the two species share the same lores covered with small, dense, scale-like feathers, and the same half-feathered tarsi...
A few years later, Bonnaterre & Vieillot (1823) used the very same name,
Buteo cristatus, for the Crested Honey-buzzard
Pernis ptilorhyncus.
Except for the range given by Vieillot (Nouvelle-Hollande = Australia), I don't see anything in the 1816 description that would point away from the described bird being an immature Crested Honey-buzzard... Which not only could make the use of
cristatus for Australasian Ospreys incorrect, but also could make it the valid name of the Crested HB, as it clearly predates
Falco ptilorhyncus Temminck, 1821.
Incidentally, at the MNHN, the type specimen of
Falco ptilorhyncus Temminck, 1821 and of
Buteo cristatus Bonaterre & Vieillot, 1823, is apparently also marked as being the type of "
Buteo cristatus Vieillot" (not "
Buteo cristatus Bonnaterre & Vieillot";
http://www.mnhn.fr/publication/zoosyst/z01n1a15.pdf).
But the alternative name also has problems...
Pandion leucocephalus John Gould, 1838 (April). A synopsis of the birds of Australia and adjacent islands. Part III, pl. 4 + text.
Richmond Index card (Zoonomen) :
http://www.zoonomen.net/cit/RI/SP/Pand/pand00025a.jpg
(Can't find the full text on the web.)
The Richmond Index suggests that this name is preoccupied.
Pandion leucocephalus "N.F." (= "S.D.W." =? S.D. Wood), 1835 (June). Remarks on vernacular and scientific ornithological nomenclature.
The Analyst, II, p. 305.
Richmond index card (Zoonomen) :
http://www.zoonomen.net/cit/RI/SP/Pand/pand00022a.jpg
Full text :
http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/20086
(This text is signed "N.F.", but a subsequent paper published in the same journal (
The Analyst, III:26-35,
http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/20169), this one signed "S.D.W.", is unambiguously from the same author ("In a former paper, (vol. ii, p. 305), I pointed out..."). More about this author can probably be found in
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1474-919X.1938.tb00201.x but I've no access to it.)
The 1835 text states, among other things:
"Selby, in his excellent "British Ornithology,"* places the white-tailed ossifrage (
Ossifraga albicilla, mihi) in a different genus from the golden eagle, (
Aquila aurea, Willughby,) and yet he calls it eagle, both in vernacular and scientific nomenclature. The white-headed osprey (
Pandion leucocephalus, mihi,) is also called
Haliaeetus, or sea eagle, although not in the genus
Aquila."
The asterisk refers to a footnote about Selby's work:
"* Two vols. 8vo., 2d. edition; 1833, Longman & Co."
It seems quite clear that, in this work, "S.D.W." intends to replace the name
Pandion Haliaeetus, used by Selby for
British Ospreys, with another name that he proposes himself ("mihi" = myself). There is no description, but there is a clear reference to Selby's
British Ornithology (full text here :
http://www.archive.org/details/illustrationsofb01selbrich), and this work does include a description, which should be enough...
I see no good reason that would make the 1835 name unavailable. And if it is available, it is a senior primary homonym of Gould's name, and makes the latter permanently invalid...