Taxonomy books

Monographs on Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse (1826-1898), director of the ‘Journal de Conchyliologie’.

During the past years a project has been done on the legacy of Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse, based on the so-called ‘Crosse archive’ with correspondence preserved during his years as managing director of the ‘Journal de Conchyliologie’. This project has resulted in the preparation of three volumes, the first of which have been published in 2022 and 2023. The third volume will be published in 2024.

The Frenchman Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse was educated as a lawyer but dedicated his whole life to malacology. He joined the editorial board of the Journal de Conchyliologie in 1861, and was managing director of the journal until his death in 1898. He was thus one of the spiders in the web of late 19th century malacology and had a core position to make a great contribution to this discipline. We have reconstructed his legacy with the help of archival sources and found his type material in the historical collections of several museums.

This series of monographs is published thanks to financial support from the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences. The electronic version (PDF) is available for free and can be downloaded below. After the download you can open the file with a specific password for each volume (see below). A print-on-demand hardcover version is also available; you can directly order it yourself from here.

Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse (1826-1898). 1, biography, bibliography and new taxa introduced

This volume comprises 338 pages and more than 700 figures

This first volume is made up of two parts. In the first part we present his biography based both on published and unpublished sources. His biography gives details about his childhood, family, and professional life. We highlight his role as malacologist and his relations with field collectors. His contact network will be dealt with in the second volume.

In the second part, the bibliography of Crosse lists 697 publications, among which the Études sur les mollusques terrestres et fluviatiles du Mexique et du Guatemala. This magnum opus by P. Fischer and Crosse appeared in 17 parts of which we give a collation. Crosse described 987 taxa, of which 14 as available names at family or higher level, 102 at genus level, 850 at species level; of these 262 were introduced as varieties. These taxa comprise Mollusca from all major groups from around the world, as well as some Brachiopoda. Type specimens have been traced as far as possible, or the original figure(s) are presented when available. Twenty- five taxa remained originally unfigured and are now figured with type material. Indices are given to unlock the data on taxa and persons.

First volume:

Breure A.S.H., Audibert C. & Ablett J.D. (Editors), 2022. Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse (1826-1898). 1, biography, bibliography and new taxa introduced. Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, Brussels, viii + 330 pp.

ISBN 978-9-07-324258-6 (PDF) / 978-9-07-324257-9 (p.o.d.).

Link to pdf version (password: Crosse2022) – Link to P.O.D. Version.

Second volume:

Breure A.S.H., Audibert C. & Ablett J.D. (editors), 2023. Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse (1826-1898). 2, contact network and selected correspondence from France, Germany and Spain.

Link to pdf version (password: Crosse2023) – Link to P.O.D. Version.

Third volume to be published in 2024:

Breure A.S.H., Audibert C. & Ablett J.D. (editors), 2023. Joseph Charles Hippolyte Crosse (1826-1898). 3, selected correspondence from Italy, United Kingdom and United States of America.