Improvement of common names in canid species (Canidae)

By Antoni V Milewski and Anthony J Mills · Originally published 6 August 2026

Also see

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In the common names of canids (Canidae), there is room for improvement in several spp.

‘GOLDEN JACKAL’

Confusion has arisen as follows.

For years, Canis aureus was known as the golden jackal, part of the same species as in Eurasia from the Mediterranean to Thailand.

That classification was always wrong. The tail is far shorter, and the ears are far smaller, in the true golden jackal, a typical location for which is India.

Then taxonomists woke up and reclassified the African populations as Canis anthus (subspecies bea, in the case of the Serengeti ecosystem). This is the name I prefer.

To this day, nobody in East Africa calls this a ‘wolf’. It is obviously a jackal. By the way, it happens to be remarkably similar in appearance to the coyote (Canis latrans) – whether by coincidence or common ancestry.

Then some taxonomists started calling the species Canis lupaster, probably because many of the populations in North Africa have hybridised with the wolf. It is because of this hybridisation that an association with ‘wolf’ has crept into a species that, in its pure form in East Africa, has nothing to do with wolves apart from belonging to the same genus.

What we have here is an East African counterpart for that American ‘jackal’, the coyote, whether one calls this

• Canis anthus bea, or

• Canis lupaster bea.

Please bear in mind that the concept of any pure species in the genus Canis is an ideal, rather than a reality.

The following are all now probably extinct in pure form, owing to hybridisation:

• the wolf,

• the coyote, and

• all the subspecies of Canis anthus, other than this one in East Africa.

What is called the wolf, in e.g. Yellowstone, is actually a wolf/dog hybrid.

What is called the coyote, in much of the USA, is actually a three-way hybrid (coyote/wolf/dog).

Canis anthus bea, of East Africa, is actually something special in the genus Canis, a relatively uncompromised, original, ‘pure’ form of wild canid.

So,

• I oppose calling this a ‘wolf’, and

• would even prefer to call it an ‘East African coyote’, if those were the only choices.

However, perhaps it is time to introduce a new common name, e.g. ‘Serengeti jackal’.

Regardless of taxonomic confusion (which will probably continue to swirl for years), what we have in the Serengeti ecosystem is a fauna of three jackals, all about similar in body size (10 kg) and form, but separated by habitat.

These are

• the side-striped jackal (Lupulella adusta notata) in woodland,

• the black-backed jackal (Lupulella mesomelas schmidtii) in open savanna, and

• this species (Canis anthus bea) in treeless grassland.

Because treeless grassland is the central feature of the Serengeti ecosystem and its herbivorous migrations, it is this species, Canis anthus, that – far from being some southerly form of ‘wolf’ – is, in a sense, distinctively African and equatorial.

Firstly, ‘East African jackal’ risks ambiguity because this seems somewhat apt also for Lupulella mesomelas schmidti.

Secondly, ‘Ethiopian/simien jackal’ sounds a bit inappropriate because this species is so specialised on rodents. It is arguably intrinsic to the term ‘jackal’ that the species concerned has a relatively generalised diet, including scavenging.

If Canis lupaster is a valid species, deciding on a preferred common name remains a problem. My best suggestion is ‘North African jackal’.

‘SEMIEN WOLF’

In the case of Canis simensis, we may have to start from scratch, because none of the current common names seems apt.

My best suggestion is kekebero, on the following basis.

Firstly, this is derived from the main language of the area, namely Amharic.

CitedWikipedia

Secondly, the components are ‘kebero’ for the noun jackal and ‘k’eyi’ for the adjective red.

Citedgoogle.com.au

Thirdly, the Amharic name ‘ky kebero’ is currently given in the Wikipedia site for Canis simensis.

CitedWikipedia

Fourthly, the spelling ‘kekebero’

• has the advantage that it is easily pronounced, and

• seems unlikely to be inconsistently pronounced by the various anglophone accents (mainly British vs American).

Please see.

CitedRelated post

CONCLUSION

So, the following is the gist of my current suggestion for common names, in order of importance for raising public awareness w.r.t. conservation:

• Serengeti jackal for Canis anthus bea/Canis lupaster bea

• kekebero for Canis simensis

• North African jackal for Canis lupaster (which is largely derived from hybridisation between Canis anthus and Canis lupus, the latter probably having already been hybridised with Canis familiaris).

Posted on August 6, 2026 08:19 AM by
milewski

The author added the following in comments beneath the original post.

Also cited on iNaturalistobs. 123859368

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Chatgpt MY QUESTION

Which subspecies of Lupulella adusta occurs in the Serengeti ecosystem? Supply full references.

ANSWER FROM CHATGPT

Under the traditional subspecific arrangement of the side-striped jackal, the population in the Serengeti ecosystem is Lupulella adusta lateralis (formerly Canis adustus lateralis or Thos adustus lateralis). This is the East African subspecies, extending through Kenya and northern Tanzania, including the Serengeti. The principal evidence is as follows: P. L. Sclater (1870) described Canis lateralis from East Africa. This taxon was subsequently treated as the East African subspecies of the side-striped jackal. G. M. Allen (1939), in his authoritative Checklist of African Mammals, recognized Thos adustus lateralis for the East African populations, including northern Tanzania. Coetzee (1971) retained Canis adustus lateralis in his chapter on Carnivora in The Mammals of Africa: An Identification Manual. Wozencraft (2005) likewise recognized Canis adustus lateralis as one of the valid subspecies in Mammal Species of the World, and this treatment is reflected in the Mammal Diversity Database. No published revision, to my knowledge, has proposed a different subspecies specifically for the Serengeti population. Modern molecular work has focused on the elevation of the species to the genus Lupulella, rather than on revising its subspecific taxonomy, and recent morphometric analyses found no clear morphological differentiation among the traditionally recognized subspecies of L. adusta. Full references: Allen, G. M. 1939. A Checklist of African Mammals. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology 83: 1–763.

Coetzee, C. G. 1971. Order Carnivora. In: Meester, J. & Setzer, H. W. (eds.), The Mammals of Africa: An Identification Manual. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C., Part 8, pp. 1–42.

Krofel, M., et al. 2022. Towards resolving taxonomic uncertainties in wolf, dog and jackal lineages of Africa, Eurasia and Australasia. Journal of Zoology 316: 155–168. (Adopts the genus Lupulella for the side-striped and black-backed jackals.)

Sclater, P. L. 1870. On the Mammals and Birds collected by Dr. John Kirk in Zanzibar and on the Coast of East Africa. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London (1870). (Original description of Canis lateralis.)

Wozencraft, W. C. 2005. Order Carnivora. In: Wilson, D. E. & Reeder, D. M. (eds.), Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference. 3rd ed. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, pp. 532–628. (Recognizes Canis adustus lateralis as the East African subspecies.)

MY QUESTION

Why have you rejected ‘notatus’?

ANSWER FROM CHATGPT That is a fair challenge. I should not have rejected notatus without discussing the evidence, because the issue is not straightforward.

The difficulty is that there are two competing taxonomic traditions. The “lateralis” tradition (Allen 1939; Coetzee 1971; Wozencraft 2005) applies lateralis to essentially all East African side-striped jackals, including Kenya and northern Tanzania. This is the treatment I followed in my previous answer. The older “notatus” tradition places the Serengeti and much of northern Tanzania in Canis adustus notatus, with lateralis applying farther north (Kenya and adjacent regions). The reason I preferred lateralis is simply that it is the treatment adopted by the standard modern taxonomic compilations. It was not because notatus is unavailable or invalid. In fact, several influential earlier authorities did recognize notatus. For example:

J. A. Allen (1924) recognized Canis adustus notatus from northern Tanganyika. Cabrera (1932) likewise treated notatus as a valid subspecies. Some museum catalogues and faunal works published before Allen’s (1939) checklist also followed this arrangement. The crucial question, therefore, is where the boundary between lateralis and notatus was drawn, and whether the Serengeti lay north or south of it. That boundary shifted between authors because it was based on rather subtle variation in coat markings rather than on any clear geographic break. Modern molecular studies have not tested the validity of these named subspecies, so there is no DNA evidence that settles the matter. My assessment: If one follows the modern reference works (Allen 1939; Coetzee 1971; Wozencraft 2005; Mammal Diversity Database), the Serengeti population is Lupulella adusta lateralis. If one follows earlier East African taxonomists, there is a respectable historical case for Lupulella adusta notata (= Canis adustus notatus). Given your previous questions on African mammal taxonomy, I suspect you are asking because you have encountered an older primary source assigning the Serengeti population to notatus. If so, that would not be an error—it would reflect the earlier subspecific arrangement rather than a nomenclatural mistake. END OF TRANSCRIPT FROM AI