Hi Nigel

I haven't done all of the changes to the Coleoptera checklist yet but I have investigated this genus and have made some of the necessary changes now. They are quite complex but they work out as:

Antherophagus similis Curtis, 1835
tvk NHMSYS0021122520
new name for our Antherophagus pallens (Linnaeus, 1758) [NBNSYS0000024613]

edit tvk NBNSYS0000024613 to add attribute "sensu auctt. ad 2007 non (Linnaeus, 1758)"

NEW Antherophagus pallens (Linnaeus, 1758)
tvk NHMSYS0021122529
new name for our Antherophagus nigricornis (Fabricius, 1787) [NHMSYS0020151262]

I am a little unsure about the current application of silaceus/canescens at the moment though so will contact Andrew.

Andrew lists:

pallens (Linnaeus, 1758)
=nigricornis (Fabricius, 1787)

silaceus (Herbst, 1792)
=canescens Grouvelle, 1916

similis Curtis, 1835
=pallens sensu auctt. ad 2007 non (Linnaeus, 1758)

But we have:

Antherophagus canescens Grouvelle, 1916
   =Antherophagus silaceus  sensu auct. not (Herbst, 1792)    
   =Antherophagus silaceus  sensu auctt. non Herbst, 1792    
       
Antherophagus pallens (Linnaeus, 1758)
   =Antherophagus nigricornis (Fabricius, 1787)     
   =Antherophagus silaceus (Herbst, 1792)     
   =Antherophagus nigricornis (F., 1787) 

Antherophagus similis Curtis, 1835
   =Antherophagus pallens (Linnaeus, 1758) sensu auctt. ad 2007 non (Linnaeus, 1758)    

So something isn't quite right.

:)

Andrew Duff has replied and worked out the synonymy for me. I think this has now been sorted out but it still needs a little tidying up. The problem comes in the that the "Antherophagus silaceus sensu auct. not (Herbst, 1792)" synonyms are actually "silaceus (Herbst, 1792)", which is a taxonomic vicious circle! But because in the NBN system a name carries the records attached to it it has a meaning beyond the taxonomic one that it has been used to express. As we cannot delete names once they have been released to the World, I think the solution will be to edit the attribute to convey that the meaning of this name is now different. I will take some advice on this ;)

Don't worry Nigel - it just got a bit odd there for a minute (with contradictory attributes on synonyms) but we came up with a good solution and Andrew is happy with it, which is more to the point :)

The problem was that we now have a single organism with an accepted name that means:
"silaceus of Herbst, published in 1792"

... with 2 synonyms that mean:
"silaceus used by authors but NOT the organism Herbst published in 1792"

Which is nonsense - caused by the fact that we can't delete these silly synonyms once they have been published. So I will probably fix it by taking the unusual step of editing the synonym attribute to just read "sensu auctt.", which will just show that these synonyms are a misuse by people in history but will remove the contradictory bit :D

This kind of problem comes about when "experts" think they know how to identify something and they publish lots of work on a species. So much so that their interpretation of those taxa become the standard way that others interpret them. It can become like taxonomic Chinese whispers - until another expert actually takes the trouble of examining the type specimens to check whether these assumptions are correct.

In this case, the types were examined and it was found that the names given to them were different from the way they were being used in the wider community. Hopefully the current arrangement is correct and will persist :)