Le Vaillant Plettenberg Bay

[Katrine Freggiaro]

Plettenbergdescended from the House of Plettenberg, an old aristocratic family from Westphalia in the Holy Roman Empire. His parents were Henrik Casimir van Plettenberg, colonel in the Nassau-Orange garrison in Leeuwarden and his wife, Agatha Petronella van Ammena. After his studies of law at the Utrecht University he left the country in 1764 and became in the service of the Dutch East India Company for 2 years a member of the Council of Law in Batavia. In 1767 he married Cornelia Charlotte Feith, the widow of Louis Taillefer.

At this time Cape Town was the property of a commercial company, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and not a colony of the Netherlands. At 28 years of age, in 1767, Plettenberg became "Independent-Fiscaal", the highest official of justice at Cape Town. After the death of Governor Ryk Tulbagh, Plettenberg took control of the administration; on 11 August 1771, he became governor.

On 1 June 1773, Plettenberg presided over a platoon of 30 soldiers charged with the task of salvaging goods and money from the De Jonge Thomas wrecked in a storm in Table Bay.[1] During the salvage operation, the father of one of the soldiers, Wolraad Woltemade heroically rescued men from the ship, unaided by the soldiers. In 1781 Van Plettenberg sent five ships to Saldanha Bay and wait for French escort. In the Battle of Saldanha Bay four ships were taken prize and was destroyed by the captain himself.

The French-influenced Patriotic Movement ("Patriotte beweging") became a strong opposition to him. Petitions of colonists in 1779 and 1782 to the Lords Seventeen of the Dutch East India Company and to the "Staten-Generaal" of the Netherlands in 1784 show the problems between the governor and the colonists.[2][3] The free burghers wished for greater representation in the courts and policy councils, codification of laws and some economic benefits, such as free trade (which were hindered by the trading activities of Company officials and various restrictions on the farmers).[4]

In 1781 Plettenberg defended himself in a record. In 1785 he requested for discharge and was dismissed "with all honors". He resigned on 14 February 1785 and went back to the Netherlands, where he died on 18 August 1793, at his Huis Windesheim, near Zwolle. His successor as Governor of Cape Town was Lieutenant Colonel Cornelis Jacob van de Graaff.

Plettenberg had great interest in the discovery of unknown regions and supported the exploration of southern Africa. In his time were the voyages of August Frederik Beutler, Carl Joseph Kindermann, Carl Peter Thunberg, Anders Sparrman, Francis Masson, William Patterson, Jan Splinter Stavornius or Stavorinus, Robert Jacob Gordon and Franois Le Vaillant (Levaillant).

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Historically, Telmatoscopus Eaton, 1904 has been a nomenclaturally and taxonomically problematic taxon as different authors have used different type species to define their concepts of the genus. Here it is shown that Pericoma advena Eaton, 1893 is the valid type species rather than Pericoma morula Eaton, 1893. Furthermore, the genus Seoda Enderlein, 1935 is revived for the genus comprising Pericoma labeculosa Eaton, 1893, P. morula and their relatives. The differences between Telmatoscopus and Seoda are described in detail based on historical and freshly collected material of the three putative type species. Four new synonymies are proposed: Panimerus havelkai Wagner, 1975 and Telmatoscopus seguyi Vaillant, 1990 are synonymized with Telmatoscopus advena, and Telmatoscopus incanus Nielsen, 1964 and Telmatoscopus vaillanti Withers, 1986 are synonymized with Seoda morula. A potential phylogenetic pattern in the male genital sclerites is discussed in detail. In Telmatoscopus, the jointed appendages of the gonocoxally derived parameral complex are separate small sclerites found near the bases of the distiphallic lobes of the aedeagus. In Seoda, they are fused medially to form a small, moveable triangular or arrow-shaped sclerite. Medial parameral sclerite fusion in Psychodinae is otherwise known to occur only in Pericomaini and the paramormiine genus Psychomasina Ježek, 2004; however, many genera of Paramormiini show an apparently intermediate condition where the parameres are fused in one end to form a V- or U-shaped "furca". It is hypothesized that Paramormiini is paraphyletic with respect to Pericomaini, as suggested in a previous phylogenetic hypothesis based on molecular data.

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