Ornismya esmeralda Lesson, 1843 (1 Viewer)

[Taphrospilus]

Ornismya esmeralda Lesson, 1843 OD 1843 pt.2 (1843) - L'Écho du monde savant et l'Hermès - Biodiversity Heritage Library

We can't really talk about a OD.

La Esmeralda: Ornysmia Esmeralda, Less., 1838

Therefore we have to come back what I started to discuss here:

If HBW key is correct than Trochilus Adolphei Lesson, 1843 OD here is a synonym to Phaethornis ruber nigricinctus Lawrence, 1858 OD here. I am wondering why Lessons name has no priority?

Phaethornis adolphi Gould, 1857 OD here can't be the reason as the plate an text are part of delivery 14 from Gould from the year 1857 or here as Pygmornis Adolphi. Therfore Lesson would have priority. What do I miss?


I think I found the answer myselfe ashere is written:



Would be interesting if this plates and/or the specimen still exist.

In 2018 I had some mail exchange with https://mediatheques.agglo-rochefor...e-fonds-ancien-de-la-mediatheque-de-rochefort

They own the mystere Tome 4 from Lesson which was never published.



To be sure what Lesson may have had in mind it might be required to contact them.

So first I am not sure if it is a valid name and second The Key to Scientific Names - Birds of the World ...

Lesson's 1843, “La Esmeralda”; probably after Esmeralda, the beautiful but tragic heroine of Victor Hugo’s novel (1831) ‘Notre-Dame de Paris / The Hunchback of Notre-Dame’ (syn. Chlorostilbon poortmani).

... might be correct but it would help to see the text to plate 2, 3 &4.

 

[PScofield]

I am not at all convinced this is an eponym and I can see zero evidence Victor Hugo has anything to do with this name. Esmeralda is a Spanish and Portuguese woman's name meaning green and that should be the end of the story. There are towns all around the world named precisely because of this. I very much doubt the founders of Esmeralda, Queensland had ever heard of Victor !@#$% Hugo...

 

[l_raty]

We can't really talk about a OD.

La Esmeralda: Ornysmia Esmeralda, Less., 1838

The whole thing is longer:

— (pl. 87.) La Esmeralda : Ornysmia Esmeralda, Less., 1838. Orn. poortmani, Bourcier , rev. zool., 1843 , p. 2. Hab. : Santa-Fe, Caraccas. —

IOW: the bird should be on pl. 87 of the unpublished work, Lesson named it (presumably in manuscript form) O. Esmeralda in 1838, it is the same as Ornismya Poortmani, as published by Bourcier in Revue Zoologique, 1843, p. 2., and it inhabits Santa-Fe and Caracas.
As the plate remained unpublished and Lesson did not describe the bird, and assuming the name had indeed not been published in "1838", Ornysmia Esmeralda is here adopted as a substitute for O. poortmani Bourcier 1843.

Esmeralda is a Spanish and Portuguese woman's name meaning green

Esmeralda is emerald.
FWIW, the male Chlorostilbon poortmani is certainly an all bright and shiny green, "emerald" bird... while la Esmeralda, in Victor Hugo's novel, appeared to be called by this name because of an amulet she wore, which was covered in green silk and bore a piece of green glass in imitation of an emerald. I.e., she was not herself strikingly emerald-like, like the bird.
OTOH, it's quite intriguing that Lesson used a Spanish-like article La in his French name (L' is expected in French in front of any word starting with a vowel) -- Victor Hugo did the exact same thing --, and all the other French names in this note were indeed French (or Frenchified) words: one might be right to wonder why he would have adopted a Spanish La Esmeralda in this single case -- L'Émeraude would have been much more in line with the rest.

 

[Björn Bergenholtz]

Paul, even if far, far away (geographically, that is) from Lesson's Hummingbird "Ornysmia Esmeralda" ...

... I very much doubt the founders of Esmeralda, Queensland had ever heard of ...

George Elphinstone Dalrymple (1826–1876), who named the Esmeralda Hill (after which the small township Esmeralda, Queensland, Australia, allegedly got its name*), clearly wrote:

On the S.E., a low grassy hill, green as an emerald, I named “Esmeralda Hill;” ...

[here]
​

Also see Gould's comment, re. the Bird in question (here), listed as a synonym below "414. PANYCHLORA POORTMANNI":

I shall close this account of the little Green Humming-Bird ...

Thus, indeed, Green and/or Emerald does seem to be significant (also) in this particular case ...

Hopefully of some help/use ...

/B

PS. Gould's Plate of "CHLOROSTILBON PORTMANNI" [sic – single-o, on the Plate!] = here + its text here [where poortmanni is typed with the correct double-o], telling us that this Bird is: "glittering green".

---

* According to Wikipedia (here).

 

[Taphrospilus]

Here Lessons text

 

[Björn Bergenholtz]

Thanks Martin, and well done getting Copies of those two Manuscript pages! 🏆

I think (even if not knowing French) that this will finally close the case "sour le nom de la Esmeralda": "..., ou d'émeraude glacée d'or," ... " d'un vert brilliant." ... etc., etc..

Or?

 

[Björn Bergenholtz]

Esmeralda is emerald.
[...]
... L'Émeraude would have been much more in line with the rest.

I think you're perfectly right.
[...]
Even if so, but (seemingly/apparently preoccupied) note that Lesson (also in the OD above, in post #1) called the Species in Glaucis "Les ÉMERAUDES ... Boié."

/B