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UFS biologists discover new tiny, white-thumbed bat species from Eswatini

13 October 2022 | Story NONSINDISO QWABE | Photo Rio Button

The Lowveld serotine bat, named Neoromicia hlandzeni.

Biological expeditions to the unexplored central highlands of Angola between 2016 and 2019 led to the discovery of a new tiny, white-thumbed bat species from Eswatini by Prof Peter John Taylor from the UFS Department of Zoology and Entomology and the Afromontane Research Unit (ARU), together with colleagues from the University of Eswatini (UNESWA) and other collaborators.

The bat species, named Neoromicia hlandzeni or the Lowveld serotine bat – after the Lowveld of Eswatini (eHlandzeni) – is the first new animal species to be discovered in Eswatini and given a siSwati name. The Lowveld serotine bat is tiny at four grams, has a distinctive white thumb pad, and occurs in Eswatini, South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique.

Bats make up a quarter of all mammalian biodiversity. With modern technology and the exploration of previously inaccessible regions of Africa, the rate of discovery of both animal and plant species is accelerating.

According to Prof Taylor, the Lowveld serotine bat is a new species to science. The specimen from which the species was named was collected in the lowlands of Eswatini in 2005. “Later collections of bats from the highlands of Angola, undertaken by myself and students, revealed the fact that the highland and lowland forms were actually different species. Since there was already a name for the highland bat, we needed to find a new name for the lowland bat from Eswatini and South Africa, hence it is called the Lowveld serotine bat,” he said.

The importance of integrative taxonomy, local collaboration, and biodiversity surveys

Prof Taylor is a research fellow of the National Geographic Okavango Wilderness Project, and the bat discovery took place during expeditions under the patronage of the Angolan government, the Wild Bird Trust, and the National Geographic Okavango Wilderness Project. He said the aim of the expedition was to explore the plants and animals of a wilderness area (the source of the Okavango) that had not been explored before.

The discovery also led to their paper being published in the scientific journal, the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, this month.

The publication, titled Integrative taxonomic analysis of new collections from the central Angolan highlands resolves the taxonomy of African pipistrelloid bats on a continental scale, showcases the importance of integrative taxonomy, local collaboration, and biodiversity surveys, as the description of this exciting new species would not have been possible without comparative genetic and morphological material from new collections in the poorly sampled central highlands of Angola.

Prof Peter Taylor with his students, Veli Mdluli and Alexandra Howard, working on bat research. Howard was one of the co-authors of the paper. (Photo: Supplied)

Afromontane regions as hotspots of bat speciation, diversity, and micro-endemism

Although Prof Taylor is the first author to describe this new species, the work was done with a multidisciplinary team of colleagues, students, and collaborators from the UFS, UNESWA, the University of Pretoria, the University of Venda, and Stellenbosch University, as well as the Durban Natural Science Museum and the Ditsong National Museum of Natural History, with support from the Angolan government, the Wild Bird Trust, and the National Geographic Okavango Wilderness Project.

“Describing a new species is an arduous task that can take years from discovery to publication. All the enormous collective efforts have shown the importance of collaborative biodiversity exploration using old and modern technologies, as well as the African ownership of this discovery,” Prof Taylor said.

Three of Prof Taylor's previous and current PhD students – all of them South African women – were part of this discovery process and are co-authors of the paper. All 14 co-authors in the team are African. Prof Taylor said the discovery adds a new species to the total bat list of 125 species for Southern Africa – at number 126.

News Archive

UFS law experts publish unique translation

2006-06-21

Attending the launch of the publication were from the left: Prof Boelie Wessels (senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law), Prof Frederick Fourie (Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the UFS), Prof Johan Henning (Dean: UFS Faculty of Law) and Adv Jaco de Bruin (senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law). Prof Wessels translated the treatise from corrupted medieval lawyer Latin into English, Prof Henning is the leading author and initiator of the publication and Adv de Bruin assisted with the proofreading and editing. Photo: Stephen Collett

UFS law experts publish unique translation of neglected source of partnership law

The Centre for Business Law at the University of the Free State (UFS) has translated a unique long neglected Roman-Dutch source of the law of partnership law from Latin into English. This source dates back to 1666.

The book, called Tractatus de Societate (A Treatise on the Law of Partnership), by Felicius and Boxelius is published as Volume 40 in the research series Mededelings van die Sentrum vir Ondernemingsreg/Transactions of the Centre for Business Law. It is the first translation of this Roman-Dutch source into English and comprises of a comprehensive discussion of the South African common law of partnerships.

“Apart from various brief provisions dealing on a peace meal and an ad hoc basis with diverse matters such as insolvency, there is no comprehensive Partnership Act in South Africa. The law of partnership in South Africa consists of South African common-law, which is mainly derived from Roman-Dutch law,” said Prof Johan Henning, Dean of the Faculty of Law at the UFS. Prof Henning is also the leading author and initiator of this comprehensive publication.

“Countries such as America, England, Ireland and The Netherlands have drafted or are in the process of establishing new modern partnership laws in line with new international guidelines, practices and commercial usages,” said Prof Henning.

“However, in South Africa the most recent policy document released by the Department of Trade and Industry explicitly excludes partnership law from its present company law reform programme and clearly regards this as an issue for another day,” said Prof Henning.

“Unless there is a political will to allocate the necessary resources to a comprehensive partnership law revision program, it is a practical reality that South Africa will not have a modern Partnership Act in the foreseeable future,” said Prof Henning.

According to Prof Henning South African courts have been using the Roman-Dutch partnership law sources as authority. “The English Partnership Act of 1890 is not binding and the English text books should therefore be approached with caution,” said Prof Henning.

“A treatise on the law of partnership that has been regarded by South African courts as an important common law authority is that of a Frenchman by the name of Pothier. This treatise was translated into English and was regarded as an authority of significance in The Netherlands towards the end of the eighteenth century,” said Prof Henning.

“Pothier’s opinions are however not valid throughout in the Roman-Dutch partnership law as it did not apply to the Dutch province of The Netherlands and it sometimes also rely on local French customs for authority,” said Prof Henning.

For this reason the Centre for Business Law at the UFS decided to focus its attention again on the significance of the comprehensive treatise of Felicius and Boxelius on the Roman-Dutch partnership law. Felicius was an Italian lawyer and Boxelius a Dutch lawyer.

This long neglected source of partnership law was published in 1666 in Gorkum in The Netherlands. "A significant amount of Roman-Dutch sources of authoritive writers trusted this treatise and referred to it,” said Prof Henning.

The translation of the treatise from corrupted medieval lawyer Latin into English was done by Prof Boelie Wessels, a very well-known expert on Roman Law and senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law. Prof Wessels, who has 15 degrees, spent almost ten years translating the treatise. The proofreading and editing of the translation was done by Prof Henning and Adv Jaco de Bruin, a senior lecturer at the UFS Faculty of Law.

“We want the South African courts to use Volume 40 in the research series Mededelings van die Sentrum vir Ondernemingsreg/Transactions of the Centre for Business Law as the primary source of reference when cases where Roman-Dutch Law partnership law principles are involved, are ruled on,” said Prof Henning.

The first part of the publication comprises of selected perspectives on the historical significance of the work as well as a translation of selected passages. “The intention is to follow this up expeditiously with the publication of a very limited edition of a complete translation of the work,” said Prof Henning.

A total of 400 copies of the publication will be distributed to all courts, the Appeal Court and the Supreme Court.

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Media Representative
Tel: (051) 401-2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za
21 June 2006

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