Matskási István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 98. (Budapest 2006)

Bálint, Zs. ; Abadjiev, S.: An annotated list of Imre Frivaldszky's publications and the species-group and infraspecies names proposed by him for plants and animals (Regnum Plantare and Animale)

Társaság" = Society of Hungarian Scientists), left a grand legacy: I. FRIVALDSZKY as botanist, zoologist and language reformer, whilst J. FRIVALDSZKY as a zoologist in general, who focused his activities on the insect order Coleoptera. The present paper concentrates only on the activity of the senior FRIVALDSZKY, strictly related to his descriptive works on living organisms. I. FRIVALDSZKY was the pioneer scientist in the floristic and faunistic exploration of the Balkans and the western part of Anatolia, but from a zoological point of view, he also pioneered in the less known invertebrate fauna of the Carpathian Basin. FRIVALDSZKY preapred a detailed programme on how to study the Balkan fauna and flora (FRIVADSZKY 1835a: 238-240). With this he applied the Magyar Tudós Társaság (the subsequent Hungarian Academy of Sciences) for a financial support. The application was unsuccessful. Consequently, he had to finance the programme by other means, which was general in those times: FRIVALDSZKY created a broad network of correspondence with many of the contemporary botanists and zoologists, as the greatest natural historian of his time also did, just to mention HENRY WALTER BATES (1825-1892), the great explorer of the Amazonian lowland. Specimens of desiccated plants and animals thought to represent new discoveries were sent for exchange or for selling under names he proposed. This was a general practice, as we know, among naturalists, causing difficulties already at that time (cf. CHAINEY 2005: 288-289). This is also testified by the notes we have found in The Natural History Museum (London, UK) (NHM) as item nos 46 and 52 (1846) in the "Register of Entomology (British Museum), volume 4", pp. 104-147: "Purchased from Dr. Frivaldszky, Bill 53, The insects from Turkey and Hungary on this and the following pages were named by Dr Frivaldszky. The remainder of Dr Frivaldszky'

s entered under 46.52." (no.

k

46) and "Brought of Dr. Frivaldszky Named by Dr. Frivaldszky; Cont. from 46.36." (no. 52). In this inventory there are altogether seven entries indicating that the material was purchased from I. FRIVALDSZKY as follows: 1843: no. 81; 1846: nos 36,46, 52, 54, 65; 1848: no. 118. Accordingly, DOUBLEDAY (1847, 1848) catalogued all these material under FRIVALDSZKY'

s authority; and indeed, we could locate many butterfly specimens originated from I. FRIVALDSZKY in the collections of the NHM (cf BÁLINT 1999, BÁLINT & OLIVIER 2001). The network of I. FRIVALDSZKY was really wide. In the Archives of the University Museum, Oxford (United Kingdom) one copy of the published catalogue of his collection (FRIVALDSZKY 1834) can be found alongside with several letters he addressed to FREDERICK WILLIAM HOPE (1797-1862) (BÁLINT, unpublished). Many specimens of beetles are still existing in the Hope Entomological Collections (BÁLINT, unpublished; cf. SMITH 1986: 76 and 120). Similarly, in the collections of the Muséum National d'

Historie Naturelle, Paris (France) we have found