One of the fundamental principles of nomenclature, the Principle of priority, is based on the actual date when a publication with a given description appeared, which does not necessarily agree with the date printed in the publication itself. For this reason we decided to verify date of publication for all references and give the earliest date we could find. There have been a few complex treatments on the dating of the books, and some focused on selected journals. Therefore our major objective was to complete the available information and supplement it with new data where it was not summarized. Although we tried to provide information as accurate as possible, this should not be considered as a final version but merely a starting point for others as more research, mainly in libraries, could have been done. However, such research would take much longer than the production of the catalogue itself, so we preferred to close these studies at the present point. Moreover, the global pandemic in 2020–2021 prevented us from visiting large institutional libraries that would have certainly been beneficial for clarifying publishing dates.

Each reference is followed by the date of publication (DP), which is the earliest date we were able to find to prove the existence of the work; but again as mentioned above it should not be considered definitive. Ideally the date is given complete (i.e. day, month and a year), but in many cases only year or year and month were available, so the last day of the respective month or year is placed in square brackets in accordance with the Code (ICZN 1999). Societies and bibliographic journals, journal websites, as well as additional works reporting on dates of publication consulted for dating are listed at the end of this chapter. The source of the date of publication for each reference is given in parentheses following the actual date. They are mostly self-explanatory but we would like to clarify some terms we are using: Cover – stands for all kind of covers and wrappers, permanent or those that tended to be removed when the final volume was bound. Colophon – stands either for bibliographic summary given in the books (typical verso of one of the first pages or at the end) or for that given in journals. Preprint – a work published, with its own specified date of publication (imprint date), in advance of its later reissue as part of a collective or cumulative work. Reprint – a copy of a work contained in a periodical, book or other larger work, intended for distribution detached from the larger work which contains it but without its own specified date of publication (imprint date).

Important proofs of existence provided by the entry stamps or additional important information we were able to trace in the libraries of Natural History Museum, London, UK (NHMUK), Institute of Vertebrate Biology, Czech Academy of Sciences, Brno, Czech Republic (IVB CAS), National Museum, Praha, Czech Republic (NMPC) and Zoological Institute of Russian Academy of Sciences (ZIN). Additional excellent sources of information are freely accessible electronic libraries like Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) or Gallica. In some Russian journals we used the registration date in Vsesoyuznaya Knizhnaya Palata (VKP, All-Union Book House) where all editions in the former USSR were registered. In addition to the date of publication, many Russian publications are accompanied also by the date when they were signed for print (SFP). It is the date when the corrected last version of proofs was ready and approved for printing. The printing started after this date, however, sometimes with a considerable delay, so that the actual date of publication is from about two weeks to several months (exceptionally, a year or more) later than the date when the issue is signed for print. The publications provided with both SFP and DP were issued in the interval between the two dates, but only DP should be understood as a proven date. In several issues of Entomologicheskoe Obozrenie the date when the editor-in-chief received the proof-print (now deposited in ZIN) from the printer is accepted as publication date. Moreover, many Russian publications had their date of publication in the Julian calendar, which was for the purpose of this Catalogue converted to Gregorian calendar. For several French publications we use dépôt legal (DL) as publication date, which is obligatory to be given for all publicly sold or distributed publications. It typically consists of month and year when a copy of the publication was deposited in the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Some further special cases in dating are discussed below.

For taxonomic papers that were published online first in the years 2000–2011 (Baviera 2007; D.-Y. Ge et al. 2008, 2010; Yus Ramos 2010b; S.-Q. Ge et al. 2011), the dates of publication are given from the printed versions, because the electronic versions available online did not meet the provisions of the Art. 8.6 of the Code (ICZN 1999).

Papers by Bezděk (2017), Biondi & D’Alessandro (2017a), De La Rosa et al. (2012), S.-Q. Ge et al. (2012), Gómez-Zurita & Cardoso (2021), Kolov (2017), Moseyko (2021), Nadein (2013c), Orlova-Bienkowskaya (2015), Özdikmen et al. (2020b), Vela & Bastazo (2012) were published online first, however these papers do not contain a link with registration in ZooBank and thus they do not meet the provisions of the amended Article 8.5 (ICZN 2012). Therefore, the dates from printed versions of respective journals were adopted as the publication dates.

Buysson’s (1908a) paper “Une espèce nouvelle du genre Thyamis Steph.” was published in Miscellanea Entomologica 15 [1907] (5/8): 1–3. On page 3 there is a mention of Martin Jacoby’s death on 24 December 1907, so it is probable that the issue was published during 1908. Buysson (1908b) on page 20 explicitly mentioned “Juillet 1908”. The copy in ZIN library bears the stamp 16 July 1908 (very probably a stamp from France, as it is not similar to any of the Russian stamps used in ZIN library at that time); we accept this as the date of publication.

Buysson’s (1908b) paper “Recherches sur l’epoque d’éclosion des altises …” (Buysson 1908b) was published as a supplement to Miscellanea Entomologica 15 [1907]. According to Le Moult & Bernardi (1943), this supplement was divided into two parts (pp. 1–16 and 17–39), which suggests that it was associated with two different issues of Miscellanea Entomologica. We were unable to trace which issue was associated with the first part of the supplement, but the second part was undoubtedly associated with issue 10/11 as stated on page 17. The issue 10/11 deposited in ZIN library bears the stamp 23 September 1908 (very probably a stamp from France, as it is not similar to any of the Russian stamps used in ZIN library at that time); we accept this as the date of publication of Buysson (1908b).

Papers by Daniel J. (1914) and Heikertinger (1915) were intended to appear in the 4th volume of the Münchener Koleopterologische Zeitschrift. This was ready for publication in 1914, authors received separata of their papers, but the volume itself was never published due to the outbreak of World War I and also due to the mental illness of the publisher Karl Daniel (see Heikertinger’s introduction to Wingelmüller 1937). However, the separata are considered as published works based on Art. 21.8 of the Code (ICZN 1999). The year is not mentioned on the wrappers of the separata, however, the year 1914 is generally accepted, for example in Wingelmüller’s revision of the tribe Cionini (Alonso-Zarazaga 2017) or in Bernhauer’s works on Staphylinidae (Löbl & Löbl 2015). For J. Daniel’s (1914) paper Der Formenkreis der Phytodecta variabilis Oliv. we accept 1914 as the year of publication in accordance with other works. The separata of Heikertinger’s Monographie der Koleopterengattung Derocrepis Weise were printed in 1914, but the author received and distributed them at the beginning of 1915 (Heikertinger 1925b), so we accept January 1915 as the publication date. However, he was probably not sure if the work would be considered as published just by distribution of separata therefore he “reissued” it in an slightly awkward manner. In 1922 he printed a small piece of paper with the following printed text “Wien 1922 | Im Selbstverlage des Verfassers | Franz Heikertinger | Wien XII. Thunhofgasse 8 [vertical bar separates rows]” and glued it on the cover of the remaining stock of the original separata he received in 1915. As a result, two versions of the identical separata exist in libraries. An updated version of the entire revision was published in 1925 (Heikertinger 1925b; Strouhal 1955).

The dating of papers published in Entomological Review of Japan within the years 1960–1985 is based on sheets entitled “General index of Entomological review of Japan” irregularly inserted into issues of the journal.

Dating of Fragments Entomologiques: Julien Achard published nine issues of his journal Fragments Entomologiques during the period 1922–1923, and the last issue (No. 10) was published posthumously in 1926 as a supplement of Annales et Bulletin de la Société Entomologique de Belgique. The exact publication dates are written as footers on the first page of issues 2–6. The months of publication of issues 1–3 are also listed on the last page of the wrappers, obviously printed after the printing of issue 3 and subsequently used for each issue. The NMPC library has issues 1–9 as a bound volume. The dates of issue of volumes 7–9 are handwritten as footers on first issue page by Achard himself. Known publication dates for individual issues are summarized as follows: 1 (pp. 1–16, DP: [30] September 1922), 2 (pp. 17–32, DP: 30 October 1922), 3 (pp. 33–48, DP: 30 November 1922), 4 (pp. 49–64, DP: 15 March 1923), 5 (pp. 65–80, DP: 30 April 1923), 6 (pp. 81–96, DP: 31 May 1923), 7 (pp. 97–112, DP: 30 June 1923), 8 (pp. 113–128, DP: 15 August 1923), 9 (pp. 129–144, DP: 30 October 1923), 10 (pp. 145–156, DP: [31 December] 1926).

Gebler (1830) published the paper “Bemerkungen über die Insekten Sibiriens, vorzüglich des Altai” in the second part of Ledebour’s Reise durch das Altai-Gebirge und die soongorische Kirgisen-Steppe. Schmitt (2017) pointed out that while most copies of the second part have the title page dated 1830, some have been dated as 1829. He went on to add that the most plausible explanation for the two dates is that a first small print run of the Zweiter Theil was produced in 1829, and a second, larger print run was made in 1830 with a change in title page but without stating in the work that it was a subsequent printing. This opinion was opposed by Bousquet (2017), who gave arguments supporting 1830 as the year of publication. In the present Catalogue we follow Bousquet (2017), therefore, Gebler’s taxa are assigned to the year 1830.

Graells (1851): Volume 1 of Memorias de la Real Academia de Ciencias de Madrid contains three parts and Graells’ paper is contained in the second part. There are no original covers available to us, only the title page of the volume with the year 1850. However, Graells’ paper was written in 1851 (as stated on page 163). Since the year 1851 is listed consistently in the Chrysomelidae literature for the species described in this work, we accept [31 December] 1851 as the publication date.

Grenier’s (1863) Catalogue des coléoptères de France et matériaux pour servir à la faune des coléoptères français contains two different release dates: 21 July 1863 on the title page and 6 August 1863 on the cover. A year later Grenier (1864) himself mentioned the publication of the catalogue in August 1863, therefore we accept 6 August 1863 as the publication date.

Hope (1841): Although the title page of the third part of Hope’s Coleopterist’s manual is dated 1840, we accept the publication date April 1841 given by Low (1853). See also the discussion in Bousquet (2016).

Illiger (1794) was published in Neuestes Magazin für die Liebhaber der Entomologie 1 (5): 593–620, which was included in the Leipzig fair catalogue Allgemeines Verzeichniss der Bücher in 1793 (Ostermesse p. 84). However, because the lists of books presented at the fairs were compiled before the event, some of the anticipated books were actually only issued at a later date (Bousquet 2017). Because the wrapper of issue 5 bears the year 1794, we accept [31 December] 1794 as the publication date.

Laboissière’s (1932b) paper was published in volume 20 (for the years 1914–1931) of Annales de l’Association des Naturalistes de Levallois-Perret but the volume does not contain any specific date or year of publication. However, the volume contains a list of members as of 31 March 1932. The year 1932 is also mentioned in the Zoological Record (for the year 1933) and has been consistently accepted in the Chrysomelidae literature. The publication date [31 December] 1932 is accepted.

Kocher (1963): The publication of the journal Bulletin de la Société des Sciences Naturelles et Physiques du Maroc in the 1960’s was delayed by one to two years. Kocher’s paper was published in the third issue of the volume 42 [1962] but the date of publication was not stated. We can only deduce that the third issue was published between 5 November 1963 (issue 1/2 of volume 42 – see Comptes Rendus de la Société des Sciences Naturelles du Maroc 1963: 111) and 30 June 1964 (issue 1/2 of volume 43 – see last page of issue). Because Kocher’s paper was listed in the Zoological Record for 1963 (albeit with the year 1962), for the present purposes we accept the date [31 December] 1963, but further research on the date of publication is necessary.

Konstantinov (1992b) and Lopatin (1992e) described several new taxa in the book Nasekomye Kavkaza … edited by G. M. Abdurakhmanov. The year of publication was stated inconsistently in the literature. The book title page states 1991, but in the previous Edition of the catalogue the book was dated 1996 (evidently because it was registered in the ZIN library on 31st January 1996). However, one article that appeared in the book was cited by Belousov & Zamotaylov (1993), thus the book must have existed that year. Finally, Abdurakhmanov (2017) in his biography listed this book with the year 1992, which we accept.

Kraatz (1879a, b) published two papers in the first issue of the volume 23 of Deutsche Entomologische Zeitschrift. The title page of the volume and footer on p. 3 has May 1879 on it, while the wrapper of the issue 1 bears January 1879. We assume that January 1879 is correct because the issue was listed in the session from 26 March 1879 of the French Entomological Society (Bull. Soc. Ent. Fr. 1879: 77).

Papers published in Munis Entomology & Zoology are only provided with month of publication. However, according to the journal website and the general information on the wrappers, the journal is always published on the first day of January and June, which we follow here.

Pérez Arcas (1865a, 1865b) published two papers in Revista de los Progresos de las Ciencias Exactas, Fisicas y Naturales. The volume contains nine issues. The heading of the first page of each issue is provided with a month. These months cannot be considered as publication dates, as some works are dated later than the respective month, e.g. Pérez Arcas (1865a) was published in issue 3 announced as “Marzo de 1865” but the paper was finished in May 1865 (p. 186). The exact dates of publication of both of Pérez Arcas’ papers remains unclear and we therefore consider them as published on [31 December] 1865, although they appeared in two different volumes.

J. R. Sahlberg (1903): Bouchard et al. (2021) dated this paper as 5th April 1903 on the basis of the minutes of the society meetings (Öfversigt af Finska Vetenskaps-Societetens Förhandlingar 1903, 45: 13, Öfversigt af förhandlingarna). However, the minutes state that Sahlberg wrote several works and submitted them for publication, thus the date cannot be accepted for the published paper. The exact date of publication is not known and we therefore retain it as [31 December] 1903.

Schneider & Leder’s (1878) paper named “Beiträge zur Kenntniss der kaukasischen Käferfauna” was published in two parts in the journal Verhandlungen des Naturforschenden Vereins in Brünn: pp. 3–258 and pls 1–4 in volume 16 [1877] (published in 1878) and pp. 3–104 and pls 5–6 in volume 17 [1878] (published in 1879). The separatum includes both parts together with continuous pagination 3–359 and is dated 1878 (for details see Döberl 2009). The exact publication date of the separatum is not known, however, in Gustav Kraatz’s review published in Deutsche Entomologische Zeitschrift 1879: 424, there is a note that he received a copy after New Year 1879. Therefore, it is highly probable that the separatum was published at the end of 1878, which we accept [31 December] as the date of publication.

Paper by Wiedemann & Germar (1821) was published in the volume 4 of Magazin der Entomologie, which was announced in the Leipzig fair catalogue Allgemeines Verzeichniss der Bücher in spring 1821 (Ostermesse p. 155). As explained by Bousquet (2017), some of the anticipated books were actually issued only at a later date. The entry in Leipzig fair catalogue is marked with notice “genannt Sommer” what agrees with Vorrede in volume 4 dated 1st June 1821 which clearly proves that the volume was published after the spring trade fair in Leipzig. As we have no further information, the publication date [31 December] 1821 is adopted.