It was first described by SpanishnaturalistFélix de Azara.[3] Based on his description, several names were given to the animal, including Mus megacephalusFischer, 1814 and Mus capito Olfers, 1818, both of which were largely forgotten for over a century. When capito was rediscovered in 1960, it came in use (as Oryzomys capito) for a "species" that included about all species now placed in Euryoryzomys, Hylaeamys and Transandinomys. Later, its scope was restricted, most definitively in a detailed study in 1998 by Guy Musser and coworkers, who also reinstated the older name Mus megacephalus (as Oryzomys megacephalus). In subsequent years, the western Amazonian H. perenensis was reinstated as a species and both were moved to the new genus Hylaeamys, because they are not closely related to the type species of Oryzomys.[2]
^Musser, G.G.; Carleton, M.D.; Brothers, E.M.; Gardner, A.L. (1998). "Systematic studies of oryzomyine rodents (Muridae: Sigmodontinae): diagnoses and distributions of species formerly assigned to Oryzomys "capito"". Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. 236: 1–376. hdl:2246/1630.