Species Name Misspelled?

is Paul Williams' catalogue, published in print in 1998 and updated online here:

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/projects/bombus/th.html#pensylvanicus

Here is the relevant section:

"NOMENCLATURE: Apis penfylvanica is the original spelling in DeGeer (1773). The orthography of this publication employs a long 's' (similar to 'f' or 'f'), a common practice of the period. This convention has since changed and subsequent authors (e.g. Cresson, 1863) have consistently used 's' for B. pensylvanicus.

Technically, according to the Code (ICZN, 1999: Article 32), pensylvanicus with just two 'n's is the correct original spelling, to be preserved unaltered unless it is demonstrably incorrect under Article 32.5. Article 32.5.1 states that clear evidence of an inadvertent error is only admissable if it lies within the original publication, without recourse to any external source of information (DeGeer, 1773, spelled Penfylvanie and penfylvanica consistently in this way). Any intentional change to that spelling in a subsequent publication is an unjustified emendation under Article 33.2.

In fact, whatever the interpretation of the Code, pragmatically it matters little which spelling of pensylvanicus is used unless either of the spellings were to be published as the name for another taxon in Bombus. No doubt many will prefer to use B. pennsylvanicus, although the name does appear as B. pensylvanicus in the recent checklist by Poole (1996) (and by analogy, the similar spelling of Vespula pensylvanica (Saussure) has been accepted, e.g. by Akre et al., 1980; Edwards, 1980)."

Anyone interested in bumble bees should bookmark this essential link:

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/projects/bombus/

Chestnut-sided Warbler = Dendroica pensylvanica.

ITIS search of "pensylvanica" returned a ground beetle, leaf beetle, blister beetle, wood cockroach & the good ol' Western Yellowjacket. Plus a couple fungi and a host of plants.

"Pennsylvanica" returned a ground beetle, rove beetle, humpedbacked fly, a ceridomyid, blister beetle, minute moss beetle, crane fly, bee, firefly, assassin bug & ant. Plus a couple fungi and just 5 plants.

Wouldn't it have been quicker to just say "somebody way back in the beginning misspelled Pennsylvania and due to the rules of how naming insects have been set up, it can't be changed now?"

According to ICZN code, the intended original spelling of the species
name (no matter how bizarre) remains valid unless it later can be
shown, for example, that it was the result of some inconsistent
typographical error. In many cases it is the later writers
who, intentionally or unintentionally, corrupt the original
spelling which then becomes erroneously entrenched in the literature.

Regarding the usage of "pensylvanicus" in the case of a well-known cantharid beetle, here is an insightful excerpt from an article in The Great Lakes Entomologist Vol 39, No 3 & 4, pp 200-218 by careful researcher Andrew H. Williams of UW-Madison:

"The beetle usually referred to as Chauliognathus pennsylvanicus DeGeer over the past century was first described by DeGeer (1774) as Telephorus pensylvanicus. The spelling "pensylvanicus" was used by LeConte (1869, 1881), Hubbard (1880), Schwarz (1880) and Riley (1880), though Riley (1869, 1872, 1873) had earlier used the spelling "pennsylvanicus". At the time of DeGeer's description, "Pensylvania" was a common and apparently acceptable spelling for the colony, so his original spelling should not be considered incorrect. The correct name for this beetle is Chauliognathus pensylvanicus (DeGeer)".

Novel scientific names can only be proposed in scientific journals and books and include a description to separate the new species from other similar species. So how did the local bumble bees get their names? The first of our bumble bees to receive any attention from scientists were Bombus pensylvanicus and B. griseocollis. Those two species came into the hands of the Swedish Baron Charles de Geer (1720 – 1778) who, as many other contemporary noblemen, maintained a natural history cabinet with insects from around the world. In 1773 he published the third volume of a book series entitled "Memoires pour servir a l'histoire des insectes" and herein described two new species of bumble bees received from M. Acrelius in "Pensylvanie" (=Pennsylvania). His description was accompanied with a drawing of the actual specimen he described.

You might know it would have been a foreigner. The rest of the world demands that we use their language properly in pronunciation and speech, but nobody sticks up for the American language. It should be spelled pennsylvanicus. What with all this great soy ink we have these days, there's certainly no shortage for printing extra letters!