[NHCOLL-L:15] figured specimens and topotypes -Reply

[Steve Tunnicliff]

Charlie Sturm asked how different institutions store type, figured, cited
etc.material.

The Palaeontological Collections of the British Geological Survey are
essentially stored in three parts which are inter-related.

The Type and Stratigraphic Collection (or Museum Reserve, harking back
to the days when we were housed in the Museum of Practical Geology
and later the Geological Museum, London) consists of some quarter of a
million choice specimens. Among these are many thousands of type,
figured and cited specimens. The remainder are specimens selected for
a variety of reasons: their usefulness as comparative material, their
interest as records of particular species from particular areas or
horizons, their historical significance etc. They are selected from
donated material and especially from the Survey Collection (see below).
The T&S Collection is organised first stratigraphically, then
taxonomoically i.e. all specimens selected from the Llandovery (Silurian)
are housed in adjacent cabinets and all graptolites, brachiopods or
whatever, are housed in adjacent drawers organised if possible in
Treatise order (Treatise on Invert. Pal.).

The Survey Collection comprises some 2 million specimens collected
during the course of the Geological Survey's 160+ year history. Here are
what Charlie would describe as "run of the mill" specimens. The storage
system is based on the unique specimen number attached to each
slab/specimen, there is no stratigraphic or taxonomic organisation.

The third part of the collection is the micropalaeontological collection of
200k+ slides and preparations. Any of these which acquire type, figured
or cited status are stored separately in a micro-equivalent of the Type
and Stratigraphic Collection.


Steve Tunnicliff
Curator, Palaeontology Collections
British Geological Survey,
Keyworth,
Notts.
NG12 5GG
U.K.

Tel. 0115 936 3517
Fax 0115 936 3200
s.tunnicliff at bgs.ac.uk