implement autonyms #457
Description
quoting (and paraphrasing) @RoDuth:
»if a subspecies, etc. is created of a species then the type species automatically gets a subsp. name that mirrors the species epithet. E.g. when they decided that the Araucaria cunninghamii from PNG was a variety and named it Araucaria cunninghamii var. papuana then« ( Araucaria cunninghamii automatically became a synonym of Araucaria cunninghamii var. cunninghamii).
the other way, quoting (with minor added text) @Ejgouda:
»the moment Aechmea minor f. ubi-major becomes a synonym of an other taxon, Aechmea minor f. minor (its autonym) does not exist any longer (not needed), but in the database there are probably many references pointing to that record, like identifications etc. I solve this problem by considering Aechmea minor f. minor synonym to Aechmea minor by making it synonym to the latter. (which amounts to changing the verse of the synonymy link between the two)«
it would be good to have support for this in the software.
in practice, when you add an infraspecific taxon to a species, the species gets an automatic authonym and this autonym becomes the accepted name for the taxon. there is no extra author for it, as there is no publication other than the original species publication.
when you remove the last infraspecific taxon at a given rank from a species, its automatic autonym at that rank should be removed, or become a transparent synonym to the species.
I can imagine cases like knowing of the existence of infraspecific taxa for a species, but not having them in the collection, so that you would want to add the autonym manually, and that it stays in the database even in absence of siblings at the same rank.