Family SERRIVOMERIDAE Trewavas 1932 (Sawtooth Eels)

Revised 31 Jan. 2024
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Serrivomer Gill & Ryder 1883 serra (L.), saw; vomer (L.), plowshare, but in ichthyology the bone forming the front part of the roof of the mouth, referring to serrate vomerine dentition of S. beanii

Serrivomer beanii Gill & Ryder 1883 patronym not identified but probably in honor of Tarleton H. Bean (1846–1916), Gill’s ichthyological colleague at the U.S. National Museum (name likely does not honor Tarleton’s brother Barton, also an ichthyologist and colleague of Gill, based on the fact that Tarleton’s frequent collaborator, George Browne Goode, is honored in a junior synonym described in the same paper, Spinivomer goodei)

Serrivomer bertini Bauchot 1959 in honor of the “l’ichthyologiste éminent” Léon Bertin (1896–1954), Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle (Paris), for whom Bauchot served as an assistant in 1952

Serrivomer garmani Bertin 1944 in honor of American ichthyologist-herpetologist Samuel Garman (1843–1927), Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University, who had described only other member of genus (S. sector) known from the Indo-Pacific

Serrivomer jesperseni Bauchot 1953 patronym not identified but almost certainly in honor of Danish oceanographer Poul Christian Jespersen (1891–1951), who took part in the Dana fishery research cruises, during which holotype was collected [authorship originally given as Bauchot-Boutin]

Serrivomer lanceolatoides (Schmidt 1916)oides, Neo-Latin from eī́dos (Gr. εἶδος), form or shape: lanceolatus (L.), spear-like, described from a leptocephalus similar to Leptocephalus lanceolatus (=larval form of S. beanii)

Serrivomer neocaledoniensis Bauchot 1959ensis, Latin suffix denoting place: New Caledonia, only known area of occurrence

Serrivomer samoensis Bauchot 1959ensis, Latin suffix denoting place: Samoa, type locality

Serrivomer schmidti Bauchot 1953 patronym not identified, probably in honor of Danish biologist Johannes Schmidt (1877–1933), Director, Carlsberg Laboratory (Copenhagen) and leader of the Dana fishery research cruises (Schmidt also discovered that European Eel Anguilla anguilla migrate to the Sargasso Sea to spawn) [authorship originally given as Bauchot-Boutin]

Serrivomer sector Garman 1899 Latin for cutter, allusion not explained, perhaps referring to “blade-like” vomerine teeth and/or to how plate-like vomer divides roof of mouth into equal parts

Stemonidium Gilbert 1905 -idium, Latin diminutive suffix connoting resemblance: stḗmōn (Gr. στήμων), thread, presumably referring to its long, thin body

Stemonidium hypomelas Gilbert 1905 hypó (Gr.), Gr. ὑπό), less than, under or beneath; mélas (Gr. μέλας), black, referring to its dark ventral coloration