The Names Of Plants.pdf

Glossary
This glossary is for use in finding the meanings of the names of plants. There are
many plant names which cannot be interpreted or which yield very uninformative
translations. Authors have not always used specific epithets with a single, narrow
meaning, so there is a degree of latitude in the translation of many epithets. Equally,
the spelling of epithets has not remained constant, for example in the case of geographic
names. The variants, from one species to another, are all correct if they were
published in accordance with the Code. In certain groups such as garden plants
from, say, China, and exotics such as many members of the profuse orchid family,
commemorative names have been applied to plants more frequently than in other
groups. The reader who wishes to add further significance to such names will find it
mostly in literature on plant hunting and hybridization, or monographic works on
particular taxa.
The glossary contains many examples of words which are part of botanical terminology
as well as being employed as descriptive elements of plant names. Much terminology
stems from Greek writing and mythology. It has been given Latin form,
either by adoption into the Latin of the Romans, or since the renaissance during the
sixteenth century. Words from numerous other languages have also been added to
nomenclature by being given Latin form. It is not encouraged to compound languages
into a single name or epithet, but these do exist. When the roots are from, say,
Latin and Greek, the glossary refers to them as botanical Latin. Where a name or
epithet is compounded of a name plus a prefix or suffix, it is regarded as legitimate
modern Latinization. Hence we have such joys as cyranostigmus -a -um, being compounded
from Cyrano de Bergerac and the modern Latin stigma, from the Greek
stigma. Where place names have a classical origin, this will be provided in parentheses.
Otherwise, the Latinization of place names may be assumed to be modern Latin.
Glossaries of terminology are often to be found in textbooks and Floras. The sixth
edition (1955) of Willis’ Dictionary of Flowering Plants and Ferns (1931) is a particularly
rewarding source of information, and B. D. Jackson’s Glossary of Botanic Terms
(1960) is a first-rate source of classical etymological information.
Generic names in the European flora are mostly of ancient origin. Their meanings,
even of those which are not taken from mythological sources, are seldom clear,
and many have had their applications changed and are now used as specific epithets.
Generic names of plants discovered throughout the world in recent times
have mostly been constructed to be descriptive and will yield to translation. The
glossary contains the generic names of a wide range of both garden and wild plants
and treats them as singular nouns, with capital initials. Orthographic variants
have not been sought out but a few are presented and have the version which is generally
incorrect between brackets. Listings of generic names can be found in Farr
(1979–86) and in Brummitt (1992) as well as, on the Internet at www.ipni.org,
www.rbgkew.org.uk/epic, etc.
As an example of how the glossary can be used, we can consider the name
Sarcococca ruscifolia. This is the name given by Stapf to plants which belong to
Lindley’s genus Sarcococca, of the family Buxaceae, the box family. In the glossary we
find sarc-, sarco- meaning fleshy and -coccus -a -um meaning ‘scarlet-berried’, and
from this we conclude that Sarcococca means fleshy-scarlet-berry, or fleshy-scarletberried-one
(the generic name being a singular noun) and has the feminine gender.
We also find rusci- meaning butcher’s-broom-like or resembling Ruscus and -folius -
a -um meaning -leaved, and we conclude that this species of fleshy-scarlet-berriedone
has leaves resembling the prickly leaves (leaf-like branches or cladodes) of
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