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PART I - What’s in a name? Botanical Latin without (too many) tears.
Use ful refe rence books
Gilbert-Carter, H. Glossary of the British Flora. Cambridge University Press, 3 rd ed. 1964.
ISBN: 9780521114882
Gledhill, D. The Names of Plants. Cambridge University Press, 2 nd ed. 1989.
ISBN: 0521366755
(T he 2008 fourth edition is considerably enlarged, but the smaller 1989 edition seems to be
adequate and is easier to handle.)
Harrison, L. RHS Latin Names for Gardeners. London: Mitchell Beazley, 2012.
ISBN: 9781845337315
Payne, R.M. Flora of Ely. King’s Lynn: R.M. Payne, 2002.
Rose, F. The Wild Flower Key. Penguin 2 nd ed. (updated by C. O’Reilly), 2006.
ISBN: 9780723251750
Stearn, W.T. Botanical Latin. David & Charles, 1983.
………………………………………
1. How do botanical names relate to the classification of plants?
The universally accepted classification system of plants is hierarchical. Starting from the most
general category and moving down the hierarchy to the most specific, the various levels of the
classification can be mapped as follows:
Classes – Orders – Families – Genera – Species – Sub-species – Varieties – Forms
At each level of this hierarchy, further subdivisions are possible, which try to impose some order
on the relationships between members of the same group e.g. each genus may be divided into
sub-genera, and these in turn may be organised by dividing them into sections or series, so that
the closest relatives within the group are listed close together and the less similar members are
kept further apart. See Francis Rose’s The Wild Flower Key, for examples of how such subgroupings may be made at the level of “ Families” e.g. the Cabbage (Crucifer) Family on p. 196200, where six sub-groups are identified on the basis of their physical properties.
We shall focus on plant names as they related to three levels of the main hierarchy structure
outlined above: Families – Genera – Species. The basic unit of classification is the Species.
How are plants assigned to a given Family, Genus, or Species? T hey must share “a sufficient
number of common features to suggest that they have all evolved from a common ancestral
stock” (Gledhill p. 10).
The features chosen to achieve this classification have changed over time:
 Early systems – Mainly culinary and medicinal concepts.
 Sixteenth century onwards – Morphology of the plant, including reproductive structures.
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
Today – Microscopic (sub-cellular) morphological features, chemical information, DNA
analysis and genetic information including mutations.
It is inevitable that as botanical knowledge widens and deepens, re-classification, and therefore
re-naming, will occur.
2.
A brief history of the naming of plants
This outline history is based around the names of those people who over the centuries have made
the most significant contribution to developing a system for the classification and naming of
plants. It helps us to understand how the present-day standardised, international system of
botanical nomenclature has come into being, and why it includes some rather peculiar features
that do not necessarily correspond to current scientific knowledge of the plant world.
The ophrastus (c. 370-285 BC)
Theophrastus was a pupil of the Greek philosopher Aristotle, and later took over his master’s
peripatetic school. He described some 500 “ kinds” of plant from a wide geographical area (he had
specimens brought back from the campaigns of Alexander the Great). He was probably the first to
recognise certain physical distinctions between groups of plants e.g. monocotyledons and
dicotyledons, and also the reproductive process of pollination. He named many plants –
especially those that were unusual or of practical use – but did not attempt to name them all.
Dioscorides (c. 64 AD) recorded about 600 “kinds” of plants.
Pliny the Elde r (23-79 AD) compiled information about plants from the writings of 473 other
authors, describing about a thousand “kinds”. His encyclopaedic work Naturalis Historia became
a model for subsequent works on natural history.
We then jump over the so-called “ Dark Ages”, to the sixteenth century and the Renaissance
botanists, who collectively recognised and named some 4,000 “ kinds” of plants. Important
botanists of the Renaissance period include (amongst many others) John Parkinson and Caspar
Bauhin.
John Parkinson (1569-1629), a London apothecary, produced an encyclopaedia of the plants
then in cultivation. T his work was an influential horticultural landmark.
By this time, botanical publications were beginning to use plant names formed from a single word
(which was later to become the generic name) followed by an epithet (a descriptive word or
phrase) – the pattern that is still in use today. T he chief problem was that the names were not yet
standardised, so there was a multiplicity of names for a single plant. For example, Caspar
Bauhin (1550-1664), in his flora of 1623, listed eleven different names for the creeping buttercup
Ranunculus repens.
………………..
Excursus:
Paracelsus - The ophrastus Bombast von Hohenheim (1493-1541) – an obstacle to the
de velopment of scientific systems of botanical classification and naming
Paracelsus’ approach to the botanical classification was base d on his so-called “ Doctrine of
Signatures”, which claimed that God had conferred on each “kind” of plant some features that
would show humankind how they might use that plant e.g. plants with kidney-shaped leaves
could be used for the treatment of kidney disorders. Furthermore, according to Della Porta, who
supported Paracelsus’ views, the preferred habitat of some plants was ordained by God to help
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humankind e.g. the Salix (Willow) species prefers a wet habitat, people living in wet
environments are more prone to suffer from rheumatoid diseases, and the bark of the Salix
species contains salicylic acid used as an analgesic to control rheumatic/arthritic pain. Such
beliefs meant that an attempt was made to proceed with the classification and naming of plants on
the basis of how they were thought to serve human needs, rather than on the basis of observation
of clusters of features suggesting a common developmental pathway.
……………
The seventeenth century saw significant progress in the classification of plants:
Robe rt Morison (1620-1683) introduced a system for organising the grouping of plants into a
hierarchy of increasing size, and he was the first to recognise the group that is now known as the
Umbelliferae (or Apiaceae) family.
John Ray (1627-1705) utilised the distinction between monocotyledons and dicotyledons in his
classification, although he retained the distinction between flowering herbaceous plants and
woody ones. He also used a binomial system for naming plants.
Jose ph de Tournefort (1656-1708) sorted around 10,000 “kinds” or species of plant into 698
groups or genera.
But while the classification systems were developing rapidly, way beyond the primitive herbal
and “ signature” groupings, the bewildering profusion of names remained until the 18 th century
brought the seminal work of Carl Linnaeus.
Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778), a Swedish botanist who had not shown much talent for anything at
school, nevertheless managed to bring some order to the naming of plants. He classified 7,300
species into 1098 genera, and gave to each species a two-word name consisting of a generic
name, followed by a descriptive epithet – using Latin forms for both words. His naming system is
the forerunner of the binomial system in use today. T he results of his efforts were published in
two major works: Genera Plantarum, 1764 (6 t h ed.), and Species Plantarum, 1753.
Excursus: Linnaeus and the doctrine of Divine Cre ation
Linnaeus’ work on the development of a system for classifying and naming plants went hand in
hand with changes in his own attitudes to the doctrine of Divine Creation. He believed initially
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that since the species was ba sic unit of plant classification, each species must have been created
as an entity by God. At the same time, he was a ware that his grouping of plants into species, of
species into genera, of genera into families, on the basis of their observed physical characteristics,
implied a network of developmental (evolutionary) pathways defining and connecting the
different plant groups; and he must have been aware also of the experiments in hybridization of
plants being carried out in Holland at the time. At a later point, he came to the conclusion that
God had created the “ basic” plant, and from it the families and genera, but that the species and
varieties were the product of processes of natural evolution or hybridization. His views may be
inferred from the 6 th edition of his 1764 work Genera Plantarum, and also from his listing of
varieties under their species in Species Plantarum published in 1753; but they were so contrary to
current teaching on Divine Creation that he was unable to express them openly in his writings. It
was another hundred years before the theory of the evolution of species was to become the
subject of public debate with the appearance of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species by Means
of Natural Selection (1859).
………………….
3. The standardisation of botanical names
The second half of the eighteenth century and the whole of the nineteenth century saw a huge
increase in the number of known species and varieties, as plant-hunters brought thousands of
specimens back to Europe for classification and the assigning of names. The sheer numbers of
plants, and the fact that many different languages were use d to name them, resulted in a
proliferation of names and much confusion; and it became apparent that some kind of
international agreement would be needed to establish a standard system for creating and assigning
botanical names.
In the meantime, the development of the microscope resulted in a growing body of knowledge
about the cellular structure of plants and their mechanisms of fertilisation. At the same time,
beginning with the work of Gregor Mendel in the mid-nineteenth century, the questions of
inheritance of plant characteristics and variation within species were under investigation. Any
standardised system for classifying and naming plants had to take into account the new
discoveries being made in both of these fields.
Defining the le vels of classification and delimiting the spe cies
(i)
(ii)
(iii)
(iv)
The names of families and genera depend for the most part on Antoine Laurent de
Jussieu’s 1789 classification in Genera Plantarum, which searched for better ways
of grouping plants naturally, and established 100 families, most of which we still
recognise.
The binomial names of species depend largely on the foundation laid by Linnaeus’
1753 work Species Plantarum.
Delimiting a species: this process involves identifying a collection of individual
plants whose characteristics are sufficiently stable to be defined, applying a name to
this group, and specifying a “type” (i.e. an exemplar) for that name. The names of
species may change over time, in the light of new discoveries.
Defining levels below the species: Subspecies may have to be recognised, where
groups of plants within a given species have a number of distinctive features, or a
distinctive geological or ecological distribution. Subspecies in turn may be divided
into varieties, where the degree of departure from the norms of the species is of a
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lesser order. A lower level of “ form” is also occasionally recognised, where there is
just one distinctive feature resulting from a genetic mutation.
Establishing the rules for botanical names
Augustin Pyrame de Candolle : Théorie élémentaire de la botanique, 1813
 Plants should have names in Latin or (if not derived from Latin) in Latin form.
 Rules of Latin grammar should apply to names consisting of two or more words.
 In choosing a name, priority should be given to the name assigned by the person who first
discovered and/or described the plant.
International Botanical Congress in London, 1862
 Adopted control over botanical nomenclature.
International Botanical Congress in Paris, 1867
Adopted the Four Laws of Alphonse de Condolle (son of A.P. de Condolle):
 A single plant species should have no more than one name.
 No two plant species should share the same name.
 If a plant already has more than one name, the valid name should be the earliest one to be
published after 1753 (the date of Linnaeus’ Species Plantorum).
 The author’s name should be cited after the name of the plant.
International Botanical Congress in Vienna, 1905
 The requirement to use Latin was written into the rules for the first time.
The “ Kew Rule” was overturned in 1930
 British botanists (unlike others) had adopted the so-called “ Kew Rule”, using only
those epithets published after the plant had been assigned to its correct genus. The
Kew Rule was eventually defeated in 1930 in favour of a rule giving priority to the
epithet first published from 1st May 1753 onwards.
The United States of America issued its own Code of Botanical T axonomy in 1947
 This “ Rochester Code” disregarded the requirement to use Latin names.
Full international agreement on the rules for botanical nomenclature (including the use of Latin)
was finally was reached in 1959 and was made retroactive to 1st January 1935.
The present International Code of Botanical Nomenclature has a set of six underlying principles
(set out by Gledhill p. 28), which have evolved directly from the “ Four Laws” of Alphonse de
Condolle. T he code is, however, constantly reappraised in the light of growing knowledge in the
fields of plant morphology, chemistry and genetics. It includes detailed rules about the procedures
required for validating any new plant name.
4. Naming cultivate d plants
What relevance did the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature have for horticulturalists?
Plant breeders needed to follow the code in order to protect the new varieties that they produced,
while specialists or collectors of a particular plant group needed to reference the botanical names
in order to distinguish between all the varieties within their chosen group. Ordinary gardeners, on
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the other hand, frequently got by with the common names of their plants, without any reference at
all to the botanical ones – which meant that many garden centres, seed catalogues, etc. tended to
do the same. Until the 1950s, then, there was a confusing diversity of approaches to the matter,
including the mixing of botanical and vernacular names, applying botanical names at the wrong
level e.g. genus names applied to species (or vice versa), and using so-called “ fancy names” with
no particular reference to the plant world at all.
“The Cultivate d Code ”, 1952-53
At the 1952 meeting of the International Botanical Congress, a Committee for the Nomenclature
of Cultivated Plants, in agreement with the International Horticultural Congress, adopted an
international code for the naming of cultivated plants. T he agreed set of rules became known as
The Cultivated Code. It was first published in 1953, and has been revised periodically since then.
The aim of the code is to “ promote uniformity and fixity in the naming of agricultural,
sylvicultural and horticultural cultivars (varieties)”. It thus provides a measure of protection to
plant breeders, for although it has no legal status in itself, it can be enforced in law with the
assistance (in Europe) of the Community Plant Variety Rights Office.
Cultivars and their name s
The Cultivated Code introduced the term “ cultivar” (cv.) to encompass varieties/derivatives of
wild plants produced under c ultivation. Only one category of cultivated variant of an individual
wild plant is allowed: namely, the cultivar or “ garden variety” (not to be confused with the
botanical variety). The processes that may be used to produce a plant that qualifies as a c ultivar
are specified in detail in the code. Despite this degree of specificity, however, the Cultivated
Code is more flexible than the Botanical Code, in that it allows for the existence of groups of
plants with particular sets of features related to the needs of horticulture and farming e.g. disease
resistance, or frequency of cropping. It achieves this flexibility by having no requirement for
“types”, but instead “ regarding cultivars as part of an open system of nomenclature” (Gledhill
p.48).
From 1 st January 1959, in another departure from the Botanical Code, every new cultivar has to
receive a “fancy name” which is not Latinized. This name may come from any source: a person,
the nursery of origin, a descriptive term, or a phrase with more than one source (such as the
cultivar of Nepeta called “ Six Hills Giant”, a “fancy name” combining a location with a physical
feature of the plant). Those cultivars that already had a Latin name before 1959 continue to be
identified by this name. There is therefore a mixture of older Latin and more recent “fancy
names” in the cultivars of some species: one such example is Nigella Damascena, where pre1959 varieties have old Latin names e.g. alba, flore pleno, while more modern cultivars bear the
names “ Miss Jekyll” (below left) and “ Oxford Blue” (below right).
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PART II - What’s in a name ? Botanical Latin without (too many) te ars.
How botanical names are constructe d
1. Highe r le vels of the classification: Classes (Supe r-orde rs) and Orde rs
Names may reflect some salient physical feature characteristic of the whole group e.g.
Monocotyledons referring to the single first leaf of a seedling (formed, unlike later leaves, from a
significant part of the embryo). The leaves of monocotyledons are normally parallel-veined. T his
group includes the family Poaceae (grasses).
Other names for higher-level groupings are taken simply from the Latin term for the most
familiar member of the group at the lower level of the genus or family e.g. the order Rosales,
which of course includes the family Rosaceae.
2. Family names
The Latin names of plant families are adjectives in a feminine plural form, but are used as nouns.
Each name consists of two parts: (i) the stem-name of the type; (ii) the suffix -aceae, a feminine
plural form meaning ‘belonging to, of the nature of’:
Genus
Ranuncul-us
Nymphae-a


Family
Ranuncul-aceae
Nymphae-aceae
Vernacular name
Buttercup family
Water-lily family
Sometimes these rules of construction have been set aside. For many years, the Botanical Code
included provision for a name that had long-standing use and wide acceptability to be
“ conserved”, even though it did not meet all the requirements of the Code. Some of these names
are still found in the literature, although the tendency in more recent floras and other published
works is to use names that comply fully with the Code. The following are the eight “conserved”
family names and their more recent equivalents:
Old “ conserved” name
Compositae
Cruciferae
Gramineae
Guttiferae




New name
Genus name on which
new name is built
Aster (G. & L. star)
Brassica (L. cabbage)
Poa (G. pasture)
Clusia (name commemorating
the Flemish Renaissance botanist
Asteraceae
Brassicaceae
Poaceae
Clusiaceae
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Labiatae
Leguminosae
Palmae



Lamiaceae
Fabaceae
Arecaceae
Umbelliferae

Apiaceae
Charles l’Ecluse)
Lamium (G. throat, gullet)
Faba (L. broad bean)
Areca (plant name used on
Malabar Coast of India)
Apium (L. celery, but used by
some L. authors to refer to a
group of Umbellifers)
3. Genus names
The Latinized name of a genus is usually a singular noun, or another part of speech (e.g. an
adjective or verb) functioning as if it were a singular noun. By convention, the name is always
written with a capital letter. It can be taken from any source whatever: some examples of the
diversity of sources and internal structures of genus names are set out below:
Genus name
Source language / part(s) of speech
Meaning
(a) Iris
Greek / noun
rainbow
(b) Galium
Greek / noun
milk
(c) Hebe
Greek / proper noun
Greek goddess
of youth
(d) Melilota
Greek / 2 nouns in apposition
meli = honey
lotos = name of
various plants
(e) Bellis
Latin / adjective
pretty
(f) Parietaria
Latin / adjective
of walls
(g) Fumaria
Medieval Latin / compound noun
Fumus+terrae
smoke of the earth
(h) Teraxacum
PersianMedieval Latin / noun
bitter pot-herb
(i) Linnaea
Made-up name commemorating Carl Linnaeus
(j) Buddleia
Made-up name commemorating Adam Buddle,
a seventeenth century botanist
(k) Petunia
Brazil / noun
tobacco
See Rose Dixon’s more complete listing of common genus names for many more examples, with
interesting notes on their origins.
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4. Spe cies names
Species names are normally composed of two parts:
 a genus name, followed by…
 an epithet: that is, a descriptive word – usually (but not always) an adjective –
providing more specific information about the species concerned.
Following the rules of Latin grammar, the adjectival component needs to ‘agree’ with its noun.
We shall discuss what is involved in grammatical ‘agreement’ at a later stage; but for the moment
it is enough to say that the adjective must have:
 the same number as its noun (singular or plural)
 the same gender as its noun (masculine, feminine or neuter).
T urning from the grammar of species names to the semantics of their epithets, it is interesting to
discover how wide-ranging they are in terms of their sources and meanings. T he sheet attached
with the title Selected Specific Epithets and their Meanings lists 87 of the most commonly found
epithets, and gives the meaning of each. T he meanings fall into a number of broad semantic
categories, which might include the following:
Semantic group
Latin species name
Meaning of epithet
Common name
Geographical
Erigeron canadensis
Parietaria judaica
Canadian
Judaean
Canadian Fleabane
Pellitory-of-the-wall
Note that country names can be misleading e.g. Muscari armeniacum, a garden species of Grape
Hyacinth, is a native of China, not of Armenia!
Habitat
Malva sylvestris
Cirsium arvense
Rumex aquaticus
of the woods
of the fields
of the water
Manner of growth
Rubus fruticosus
shrubby
Bramble
( L. frutex ‘shrub’)
creeping
White Clover
clinging
Cleavers
gregarious
Nipplewort
(i.e. growing in clumps)
annual
Annual Meadow-grass
perennial
Daisy
Trifolium repens
Galium aparine
Lapsana communis
Poa annua
Bellis perennis
Other physical characteristics
Hordeum murinum
Sambucus nigra
Cardamine hirsutum
Lactuca serriola
Common Mallow
Creeping Thistle
Scottish Dock
(found only by lakes
and streams in Loch
Lomond area)
mouse-grey
Wall Barley
black
Elder
hairy
Hairy Bitter-cress
in ranks
Prickly Lettuce
(referring to the prickles?)
Hedera helix
twining
Common Ivy
Epilobium tetragonum square
Square-stalked
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(lit: ‘four-cornered’)
Acer pseudo-platanus false Plane tree
Veronica hederifolia ivy-leaved
Reproductive features Anisantha sterilis
Urtica dioica
Uses: medical, culinary, etc.
Taraxacum officinale
Sisymbrium officinale
Papaver somniferum
Serratula tinctoria
Association with a person
Buddleia davidii
Willowherb
Sycamore
Ivy-leaved Speedwell
sterile, infertile
Barren Brome
Greek: ‘of two houses’ Common Nettle
(i.e. separate male &
female plants)
having medical use
(lit: from a shop
of an apothecary)
having medical use
sleep-inducing
used in dyeing
Dandelion
Hedge Mustard
Opium Poppy
Sa w- wort
Genus name commemorates 17th century
botanist Adam Buddle; the epithet
commemorates l’Abbé Armand David, a
19 th century plant-collector and specialist in
Chinese plants.
Geranium robertianum Herb Robert.
The epithet does not refer to a botanist or plantcollector, or even (as far as we know) to any
particular medieval Robertus.
The web-site found at http://wildflowerfinder.org.uk presents a more detailed categorisation of
epithets, where, for example, my category ‘Physical characteristics’ is subdivide d into Leaf
Shape, Leaf Edge, Flowers, Shape/Posture, Hairs, and Property (rather a vague category covering
a number of characteristics including texture, tuberous roots, horned shapes, and so forth). T his
is not a particularly scholarly listing, but it does provide quite a useful starting point for
investigating epithets. Some of the terms listed are to do with the genetic properties of plants e.g.
the number of complete sets of chromosomes (the Ploidy level) within the nucleus of a cell
involved in the reproductive process. T hese terms are important in classification and in plant
breeding – for example, in developing new varieties of wheat; but as far as I know, contrary to the
impression given in this list, descriptive terms such as haploid, diploid, triploid, etc. have not
(yet) found their way into the nomenclature of wild plants or even of cultivated ones. On the
other hand, despite its shortcomings, this list does remind us helpfully that a few endings of
epithets have a particular meaning in themselves:


-oides means ‘resembling’ e.g. Laburnum anagyr-oides, ‘resembling the genus Anagyris
(in being curved backwards)
-escens (-ascens) means ‘becoming’, and may be attached, for instance, to the epithet of a
plant derived by cross-breeding e.g. Populus x canescens, ‘Grey Poplar’ resulting from
the cross fertilisation of Populus alba, ‘White Poplar’ and Populus tremula, ‘Aspen’.
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Regarding the second of these examples, I think that it would be more useful to remember that the
general suffix –ens (-ans) marks the present participle form of a verb. It is therefore used to
indicate any form of ongoing process: thus repens, ‘creeping’; patens, ‘spreading’; graveolens,
‘emitting a strong scent’; virens or virescens ‘becoming green’ (in contrast to the adjective
viridus, ‘green’), and finally, returning to our original example, canescens ‘becoming white’
(present participle of the verb caneo, ‘to be white’).
5. The grammatical formation of Latin name s
Notice that whatever the source of the name, the word is always Latinized in form; and, as we
shall see later, when the different words which constitute the name of a species are put together,
they have to obey the rules of Latin grammar.
Some knowledge of Latin word-formation and grammar is certainly useful in learning and
remembering botanical names. However, even a few very basic facts about Latin should be
sufficient to help us become more familiar with them.
Latin has three grammatical systems that affect the form of any given noun or adjective: the
system of numbe r, the system of gende r, and the system of case -marking.
Numbe r: Nouns may be singular or plural. In English we have a variety of ways of changing a
noun from singular to plural: the commonest is to suffix the word with –s or –es, or occasionally
with –en (oxoxen; other ways involve an internal vowel-change (man men, mousemice).
In Latin, the plural is usually formed by adding a plural ending, or by replacing a singular ending
with a plural one. T he actual forms of the pluralising suffix vary considerably, as the examples
below show:
Singular
flos
pin-us
ros-a
Plural
flor-es
pin-i
ros-ae
Meaning
‘flower’
‘pine tree’
‘rose’
As already mentioned, the nouns used to name botanical families are always in the plural form:
Aster-aceae, Ranuncul-aceae, etc. Singular nouns are normally used in genus and species names
although examples of plural forms are found occasionally. Any adjective, numeral, or other
descriptive word that qualifies a noun must agree with that noun in number.
Ge nder: Most European languages distinguish between genders to a greater or lesser degree.
All Latin nouns belong to a specific gender i.e. they are masculine, feminine or neuter in form,
and any adjective, numeral or other word that qualifies the noun has to agree with it in gender. In
the examples of species names given below, the first component of the name is a noun whose
gender I have indicated in the third column; the second component is an adjectival word whose
ending “agrees” in gender with the noun that it describes:
Noun
Melilotus
Adjective
alb-us
Gender
Masculine noun & adjective,
Gender indicated by the suffix –us
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Common name
White Melilot
Sinapis
alb-a
Chenopodium alb-um
Feminine noun & adjective,
Gender indicated by the suffix -a
White mustard
Neuter noun + adjective
Gender indicated by the suffix –um
Fat-hen
Note that for some reason the names of trees are typically feminine in Latin: so even names
which have the masculine-looking ending -us e,g, Pinus ‘Pine’, Ulmus ‘Elm’, Prunus ‘Plum’, are
actually feminine in gender, and therefore trigger feminine endings on following adjectival words
e.g. Prun-us spinos-a ‘Blackthorn (Sloe)’.
What if the ending of the e pithet appears not to match the ending of its noun?
Agreements in gender and number in a species name are easy enough to understand when the two
endings look alike:
Ranuncul-us bulbos-us
Athae-a hirsut-a
Gerani-um pusill-um
Oxal-is exil-is
Masc. sg. endings –us
Fem. sg. endings –a
Neut. sg. endings –um
Fem. sg. endings –is
Bulbous Buttercup
Rough Marsh-mallow
Small-flowered Crane’s-bill
Least Yellow-sorrel
In many cases, however, the gender-number endings are not at all similar. We have already
mentioned feminine tree names, where despite the agreement in gender and number, the wordendings look very different from each other. Here are some more examples of apparent
mismatches:
Ranuncul-us acr-is
Senecio vulgari-is
Malv-a sylvestr-is
Mercurial-is annu-a
Cirsi-um arvens-e
Eriger-on canadens-is
Gali-um aparin-e
Masc. sg. endings -us/-is
Masc. sg. endings -io/-is
Fem. sg. endings -a/-is
Fem. sg. endings -is/-a
Neut. sg. endings -um/-e
Neut. sg. endings -on/-is
Neut. sg. endings -um/-e
Meadow Buttercup
Groundsel
Common Mallow
Annual Mercury
Creeping thistle
Canadian Fleabane
Cleavers
In these examples, the endings of the paired words may differ in form for a variety of reasons.
De clensions or groups of nouns and adjective s
One of the most common explanations is that the noun and its accompanying adjective belong to
two different groups (declensions) in Latin, each group having its own individual set of wordendings. T here are five distinct groups/declensions of nouns in Latin, summarised by Gledhill
(p.35). Gledhill also charts twelve of the most frequent patterns of adjectival endings (p. 37).
Thus the noun Ranunculus belongs to the second group or declension, where the basic masculine
singular form ends in –us. The adjective acris belongs to the third group or declension of
adjectives in Gledhill’s list, and its basic masculine singular form ends in –is. So the two words
agree in number and gender, but the endings that mark these categories differ in shape.
Case Marking
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In addition to the fact that nouns and adjectives may belong to different groups with distinct sets
of word-endings, there are other reasons for seemingly mismatched endings in our examples
above. Latin nouns and adjectives are not only marked for Numbe r and Gende r (and a paired
noun and adjective must agree in these two categories), but they are also marked for Case .
“ Case” refers to the form that a noun takes according to its grammatical role in a clause/sentence.
Thus, a noun in the subject role will take one form, the same noun in the direct object role will
take another form, and in the possessive role it will take yet another. If the noun is qualified by an
adjective, then the adjective will have to agree with its noun in case, so it will appear in its
corresponding subject, direct object, or possessive form.
These three cases are the ones that you are most likely to encounter in plant names. The technical
names for them are:
Nominative Case
Accusative Case
Genitive Case
(subject role)
(direct object role)
(possessive role)
Like number and gender, case is also encoded in the endings of words. So in the form
Ranunculus, the little ending –us carries a heavy load: it signals number (singular), gender
(masculine) and case (subject role, therefore nominative case). Furthermore, each group
(declension) of nouns and adjectives has its own set of number-gender-case endings. This sounds
complicated, but in fact in botanical Latin you are likely to come across only a limited range of
possible endings, and these should soon become fairly familiar.
In our sample of Latin species names, the noun in initial position, and its epithet where this is an
adjective, will be in the subject or nominative form.
Ranunculus
‘Little-frog’
Noun masc. sg.
Subject (nominative)
acris
‘acrid, sharp’
Adj. masc. sg.
Subject (nominative)
Meadow buttercup
When the epithet consists not of an adjective, but of another noun, there are two possible
structures:
(i)
e.g.
Ranunculus
‘little-frog’
Noun masc. sg.
Subject (nominative)
(ii)
e.g.
T wo nouns in apposition
ficaria
‘small-fig’
Noun fem. sg.
Subject (nominative)
Lesser Celandine
T wo nouns in a possessive relationship
Primula
‘little-firstling’
Noun fem. sg.
Subject (nominative)
veris
‘of-the spring’
Noun neut. sg.
Possessive (genitive)
of ver ‘spring’
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Cowslip
Pilosella
‘Little-hairy-thing’
Noun fem. sg.
Subject (nominative)
officinarum
Mouse-ear Hawkweed
‘of-apothecaries’ shops’
Noun fem. pl.
Possessive (genitive) pl. of officina
Notice that where two nouns are in apposition as in (i), they both have nominative case, but they
may differ in gender and/or in number. If the two nouns are in a possessive relationship, as in (ii),
then by definition they differ in case, and may also be different in gender and number.
Sometimes, case marking will exist within a compound word that forms one part of a species
name, as in the epithet bursa-pastoris:
Capsella
bursa
-pastoris
Shepherd’s-purse
‘little-box’
‘purse’
‘of-shepherd’
Noun, fem. sg.
Noun, fem.sg. Noun. masc. sg.
Subject (nominative) Subject (nom.) Possessive (genitive)
To summarise, species names composed of [noun + adjective] exhibit grammatical agreement
between their two components. In cases where both components of the name are nouns [noun +
noun], there appears to be no grammatical agreement in operation (except occasionally within a
compound word) - and this lack of agreement applies to all [noun + noun] constructions, whether
the second noun is nominative or genitive in case.
Comparative and supe rlative adje ctives
One final note about adjectival epithets: these sometimes occur in their comparative forms
(bigger, taller, thinner, etc.) or superlative forms (biggest, tallest, longest, etc.). One of the most
common patterns of comparative and superlative adjectival forms is set out below:
Masc.
Long-us
Long-ior
Long-issimus
Fem.
long-a
long-ior
long-issima
Neuter
long-um
long-ius
long-issimum
Meaning
long
longer
longest
Examples of epithets in the comparative and superlative forms are seen below:
Fraxinus
‘Ash tree’
excelsior
‘higher’
Ash
Iris
‘Rainbow’
foetidissima
‘most stinking’
Stinking Iris
Ailanthus
‘T hing-whichreaches-heaven’
altissima
‘tallest’
Tree of Heaven
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