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Taxacom: Fwd: Two or more authors: language

Thomas Pape tpape at snm.ku.dk
Wed Aug 6 08:04:29 CDT 2025 

Erikjan wrote: "[...] provided that all authors of the name are cited in full elsewhere in the same work, either in the text or in a bibliographic reference."
Correct.
We have discussed this in the ongoing work on revising the zooCode and we may decide to propose that this part is omitted from the next version.
The word "provided" means that the Recommendation of "[first author] et al." depends on whether or not all authors are mentioned somewhere. Much depends on the individual situation (context, number of co-authors, editorial preferences, etc.).

Alternatives like "Andersen, Hansen et al." or "Andersen, [21 authors] & Hansen" would be fully acceptable.

Frederick wrote: "...and "&" "originated as a ligature of the letters of the word et" - wikipedia."
Exactly, which shows that this is mainly about tradition. I have not seen "& al." being used, although it has the same meaning as "et al.".

/Thomas


-----Original Message-----
From: Erikjan Rijkers <er at xs4all.nl> 
Sent: 6. august 2025 14:40
To: Thomas Pape <tpape at snm.ku.dk>; Taxacom (taxacom at lists.ku.edu) <taxacom at lists.ku.edu>
Subject: Re: Taxacom: Fwd: Two or more authors: language

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Op 8/6/25 om 14:21 schreef Thomas Pape via Taxacom:
> In zoological nomenclature, author citation and year of publication do not form part of the name of a taxon and their citation is optional, although customary.
>
> The zoo-Code has this Recommendation 51C. Citation of multiple authors. When three or more joint authors have been responsible for a name, then the citation of the name of the authors may be expressed by use of the term "et al." following the name of the first author [...]. Note that this is not a requirement. The choice of "[first author] et al." is based on the fact that this is the predominant practice in the taxonomic literature.
>
> The zoo-Code uses "&" in all Examples and Recommendations where situations with only two authors of a scientific name occur.

And note that 'Recommendation 51C' also says:

"[...] provided that all authors of the name are cited in full elsewhere in the same work, either in the text or in a bibliographic reference."


Regards,

Erikjan



> /Thomas Pape
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at lists.ku.edu> On Behalf Of Peter 
> Phillipson via Taxacom
> Sent: 6. august 2025 13:36
> To: Taxacom (taxacom at lists.ku.edu) <taxacom at lists.ku.edu>; Tony Rees 
> <tonyrees49 at gmail.com>; Mary Barkworth <Mary.Barkworth at usu.edu>
> Subject: Re: Taxacom: Fwd: Two or more authors: language
>
> An AI response to a query I just made after reading this exchange provided an interesting answer, but I am not suggesting that we should blindly follow what a machine suggests!
>
> - I copy and paste verbatim:
>
> Botanical Nomenclature: Governed by the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN).
> Zoological Nomenclature: Governed by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN).
>
> Both codes emphasize stability and clarity, and et al. remains the accepted abbreviation when citing multiple authors. The ICZN, for instance, does not allow changes like replacing et al. with & al. in formal naming.
> Unfortunately, there are no published quantitative statistics comparing the frequency of "et al." vs "& al." or other variants in botanical or zoological literature. However, here are some qualitative observations:
>
>    *   Academic Journals and Databases (e.g., ZooBank, IPNI, Tropicos) overwhelmingly use et al. in author citations.
>    *   "& al." is more likely to appear in:
>       *   Informal writing or older texts
>       *   Non-standardized databases or OCR-scanned documents
>    *   Trend Toward Simplification: In digital platforms and casual contexts, there's a mild tendency to drop Latin formalism, but this hasn't penetrated formal nomenclature.
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at lists.ku.edu> on behalf of Mary 
> Barkworth via Taxacom <taxacom at lists.ku.edu>
> Sent: 06 August 2025 12:23 PM
> To: Taxacom (taxacom at lists.ku.edu) <taxacom at lists.ku.edu>; Tony Rees 
> <tonyrees49 at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: Taxacom: Fwd: Two or more authors: language
>
> I suspect many botanists are also moving to using "&". It is used by IPNI, Plants of the World Online, and World Flora Online. It is like Leguminosae and Fabaceae. They are equally acceptable, but today Fabaceae is the more frequently encountered in online resources.
>
> ________________________________
> From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at lists.ku.edu> on behalf of Tony Rees 
> via Taxacom <taxacom at lists.ku.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, August 6, 2025 2:25 AM
> To: Taxacom (taxacom at lists.ku.edu) <taxacom at lists.ku.edu>
> Subject: Taxacom: Fwd: Two or more authors: language
>
> My feeling (which I believe is correct) is that botanical tradition is to use a bit more Latin than zoological tradition (these days). So a botanical work is more likely to say (e.g.) Smith et Jones, 1905, while a zoological work would use Smith & Jones, 1905. For my compendium, which spans both botanical and zoological names (the latter outnumber the former by around 4:1), I standardise everything to a single format, using "&" and not "et"
> to link names together ("et al." being an exception).
>
> Tony Rees, New South Wales, Australia
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> On Wed, 6 Aug 2025 at 17:08, Mikhail Daneliya via Taxacom < taxacom at lists.ku.edu> wrote:
>
>> Dear colleagues,
>>
>> In cases when there are two or more authors for a taxon I have been 
>> using "et" instead of common "&" or "and" to harmonize the language.
>> For example, Paramblyops rostrata Holt et Tattersall, 1905, instead 
>> of Paramblyops rostrata Holt & Tattersall, 1905.
>> What do you think?
>> Should it be used in the same format, like it was used originally? Or 
>> can it be freely modified? Can it be used for newly names?
>>
>> I hope I made it clear.
>>
>> Thank you!
>>
>> Mikhail Daneliya
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