434 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE STOKY OF A WORD— MAMMAL. 



By Dr. THEO. GILL, 



WASHINGTON D. C. 



r I \EE time for the final consideration of words commencing with 

 -*- M for the great English Dictionary is now very near at hand, 

 and I venture to offer suggestions respecting one in very general use 

 whose etymology has been misunderstood and erroneously stated in 

 all the published English and American dictionaries; that word is 

 mammal or mammals. I have already explained the significance of 

 the word in a periodical devoted mainly to ornithology (The Osprey), 

 but probably few readers of The Popular Science Monthly are 

 acquainted with that magazine and the data are here given in another 

 form, and with many additional facts. 



In the great Century Dictionary, a deservedly esteemed work, and 

 which may generally be implicitly trusted, the etymology of mammalia 

 is given as 'NL. (sc. animalia), neut. pi. of LL. mammalis (neut. sing. 

 as noun, mammale), of the breast: see mammal,' and, under mammal, 

 we have 'a. and n. [ = 0F. mammal=Sip. raaraaZ=Pg. mamal, mam- 

 mal=\t. mammale,, n. ; < NL. mammale, a mammal, neut. of LL. 

 mammalis, of the breast, <L. mamma, the breast]/ 



All this is misleading, if not erroneous. The name mammalia was 

 first coined and used by Linnaeus in 1758, and was formed directly 

 from the Latin ; it had nothing to do with French, Spanish, Portuguese 

 or Italian words. The concept of which the Linnsean word is the ex- 

 pression is as remote from a popular notion as could well be, and even 

 the necessity for the word (or an analogous one) can be appreciated 

 really only by the educated or, pro tanto, the scientifically educated. 

 Buff on and Pennant, for example, could not realize the reason for 

 its use. 



It is noteworthy that in the Century Dictionary even the very 

 word that might have given the clue to the formation of mammal is 

 cited and yet the excellent professional etymologist who worked on it 

 was not guided into the right path. With the hint given to him, he 

 failed to see the point. Evidently, then, the etymology is not as 

 obvious as it might seem to be. 



Often, indeed, in looking over etymologies, we have been impressed 

 with the insufficiency of philological learning alone for the solution of 

 knotty questions. A living knowledge of the objects named is often 



