Gabriel Bibron

Gabriel Bibron
Born20 October 1805
Paris, France
Died27 March 1848 (1848-03-28) (aged 42)
Saint-Alban-les-Eaux, France
Scientific career
FieldsZoology, Herpetology
Author abbrev. (zoology)Bibron
Plate 89 from Erpétologie Générale

Gabriel Bibron (20 October 1805 – 27 March 1848) was a French zoologist and herpetologist. He was born in Paris. The son of an employee of the Museum national d'histoire naturelle, he had a good foundation in natural history and was hired to collect vertebrates in Italy and Sicily. Under the direction of Jean Baptiste Bory de Saint-Vincent (1778–1846), he took part in the Morea expedition to Peloponnese.[1]

He classified numerous reptile species with André Marie Constant Duméril (1774–1860), whom he had met in 1832. Duméril was interested mainly in the relations between genera, and he left to Bibron the task of describing the species. Working together they produced the Erpétologie Générale, a comprehensive account of the reptiles, published in ten volumes from 1834 to 1854.[2] Also, Bibron assisted Duméril with teaching duties at the museum and was an instructor at a primary school in Paris.

Bibron contracted tuberculosis and retired in 1845 to Saint-Alban-les-Eaux, where he died aged 42.

Taxa named in honor of Bibron

Bibron is commemorated in the scientific names of ten species of reptiles.[3]

An eleventh species, which was more commonly known as Agama impalearis, had been named Agama bibronii by André Marie Constant Duméril in 1851, however a decision by the ICZN in 1971 confirmed that the correct name was A. bibroni.[4]

References

  1. ^ Scientific Commission's voyage to Morea. Archived 2013-12-02 at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ Schmidt, Karl P.; Davis, D. Dwight (1941). Field Book of Snakes of the United States and Canada. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons. 365 pp. ("History of snake study", p. 12).
  3. ^ Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. ISBN 978-1-4214-0135-5. ("Bibron", p. 25).
  4. ^ International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (1971). "Opinion 952. Agama bibronii Duméril, 1851 (Reptilia): validated under the plenary powers". The Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature. 28: 20–21.


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