Angolabatis nom. nov.,a replacement name for the Cretaceous genus Angolaia Antunes & Cappetta, 2002 (Chondrichthyes: Rajiformes), a preoccupied name.

Miguel T. Antunes and Henri Cappetta

Cite this article: Antunes M. T., Cappetta H., 2006. Angolabatis nom. nov.,a replacement name for the Cretaceous genus Angolaia Antunes & Cappetta, 2002 (Chondrichthyes: Rajiformes), a preoccupied name. Palaeovertebrata 34 (1-2): 27-28.

Abstract

In 2002, Antunes & Cappetta published several new taxa (genera and species) in a paper on Cretaceous elasmobranch faunas from Angola. One of the new genera was named Angolaia (Rajiformes, Hypsobatidae; type-species: Angolaia benguelaensis Antunes & Cappetta, 2002, Late Campanian/Early Maastrichtian of Angola). Recently, Dr. Christian Kammerer kindly informed us that the genus Angolaia was preoccupied by a cicadellid homoptere (Insecta), published by Linnavuori & Al-Ne'amy, 1983. So, according to mIes of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN 1999, articles 52, 60) this name became unavailable. Consequently, the Rajiformes genus Angolaia is a junior homonym, invalid and must be rejected. In replacement, we propose the new name Angolabatis.