[mod.L.; cf. F. sous-espèce.] A subdivision of a species; a more or less permanent variety of a species. Chiefly Nat. Hist.
1699. Dampier, Voy. (1703), III. 75. There are … four sorts of these long-leg’d Fowls … as so many Sub-Species of the same Kind; viz. Crab catchers, Clocking-Hens [etc.].
1807. Aikin, Dict. Chem. & Min., II. 13/2. Arseniat of Lead. Of this there are two subspecies.
1859. Darwin, Orig. Spec., ii. 51. No clear line of demarcation has as yet been drawn between species and sub-species … or, again, between sub-species and well-marked varieties, or between lesser varieties and individual differences. Ibid. (1871), Desc. Man, I. vii. I. 227. Some naturalists have lately employed the term ‘sub-species’ to designate forms which possess many of the characteristics of true species, but which hardly deserve so high a rank.
1880. Wallace, Isl. Life, xvi. 339. A few flowering plants which, as varieties or sub-species, are apparently peculiar to our islands.
1881. J. C. Morrison, in Encycl. Brit. (ed. 9), XII. 19/1. Verse narrative … is … a subspecies by itself.
1898. B. Torrey, in Atlantic Monthly, LXXXII. 492/1. I was on the watch for Carolina snow-birds and mountain solitary vireos, two varieties (‘subspecies’ is the more modern word) originally described a few years ago, by Mr. Brewster.
