[Collective group Sparganum and validity of Spirometra erinacei]

Parasites and their hosts are animals, their scientific names are subject to the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature. The core principles of the Code are the Principle of Name-Bearing Types, the Principle of Priority and the Principle of Homonymy. The Code provides guidance for zoologists to use correctly the available names. An assemblages of identifiable species of uncertain generic position are treated as a genus-group level for taxonomic convenience known as "collective groups" which requires no types and does not compete in priority with other genus-group names. The vernacular of plerocercoid metacestode of pseudophyllid tapeworm is known as sparganum, and has been treated as collective group Sparganum. The author makes a rectification for the Chinese terms of Diphyllobothrium and Spirometra according to their etymology. The original designation of the type species of the genus Spirometra is Diphyllobothrium decipiens (Diesing, 1850) by Faust et al, in 1929, but not Spirometra erinacei (Rudolphi) by Mueller in 1937, and the authorship of the latter species is Faust et al and the valid name as Spirometra erinacei (Faust, Campbell & Kellogg, 1929) synonymic with S. erinaceieuropaei (Rudolphi, 1819) and Diphyllobothrium mansoni (Joyeux et Houdemer, 1928), not vise versa, which is verified by CAB Thesaurus in 2010.