NEWS102
18
PlainGoldfishof themodern“Super Red”strain.
(Naga-buna*)
C. auratus grandoculis
(Nigoro-buna*)
C. auratus langsdorfii
(Gin-buna*)
C. carassius
(Crucianor
BronzeCarp)
C. cuvieri
(Japanese or
WhiteCrucianCarp)
C. gibelio
(Gibel or
PrussianCarp)
Thenames indicatedby an asterisk (*) are
the Japanese names for these fish. With
the exception of the goldfish, these
asterisked subspecies have almost
exclusively Japanesedistributions andare
little-known,evenwithin Japan itself.One,
C. auratus grandoculis
, has a particularly
restricted distribution, occurring only in
Lake Biwa.
C. auratus argenteaphthalmus
,
the most recently described subspecies
(Nguyen,2001),comes fromVietNamand
is evenmorepoorlyknown.
The only subspecies of
C. auratus
that
most of us are ever likely to encounter is
the common goldfish, which we’ll
undoubtedlycontinue to refer toaswe’ve
alwaysdone i.e.as
Carassiusauratus
.
One thing we aremost unlikely to do, at
least, in Europe, is to use any common
name other than ‘the goldfish’…not like
theMalaysianswhoalso refer to
C.auratus
as
the
edible
goldfish…or
the
Lexicon
Goldfish
Carassius:
nameused for this fish inancient
Rome.
auratus:
means“golden”.
buergeri:name inhonor ofHeinrich
Bürger (1804-1858)
grandoculis:means“with large
eyes”
langsdorfii:name inhonor ofGeorg
HeinrichvonLangsdorff (1774-
1852)
cuvieri:name inhonor ofGeorges
ChrétienLéopoldDagobert Cuvier
(1769-1832)
gibelio: from theGermanpopular
name
argenteaphthalmus:means“with
silver eyes”
Kazakhstanis who, confusingly, call it the
gibel carp(!)…or theTaiwanesewho label
it (evenmore confusingly) as the golden
crucian carp!
