464 swingle: botanical name of the lime 



form from which the cultivated hme was derived and to which 

 Urban^ refers the lime as a variety. 



The earliest postlinnean binomial name applied to the lime was 

 Limon spinosum, published by Philip Miller in 1768 in the 8th 

 edition of his Gardener's Dictionary. The specific name spino- 

 sum cannot be transferred to Citrus because it would be a homo- 

 njmi of Citrus spinosus published by Gmelin in 1774'' for a form 

 of the lemon quite unlike the lime. The next oldest name, Li- 

 mon 'a acidissima, was published by Houttuyn^ in 1774 in spite 

 of the already existing name Limonia acidissima used by Lin- 

 naeus for the wood apple of Ceylon and India, which name Hout- 

 tuyn ruled out because he considered it inappropriate, rechris- 

 tening the wood apple Limonia pinnatifolia. Under the rules of 

 botanical nomenclature, no such substitution of names is per- 

 mitted no matter how inappropriate the original name may be. 



The Limonia acidissiina of Houttuyn was undoubtedly the 

 common lime of the East and West Indies as it was based on the 

 Limonellus sive Limon Nipis of Rumphius^ and also on an ex- 

 cellent plate published in 1705 by Juffrouw Marie Sibylla Mer- 

 ian,^ the famous illustrator of insects who spent two years at the 

 beginning of the eighteenth century in Surinam drawing and 

 studying the insects of that colony and the plants upon which 

 they feed. 



In 1777 Christmann^ in the German adaptation of Houttuyn 's 

 great work renamed the lime Limonia aurantifolia, this name be- 

 ing an avowed substitute for the invalid Limonia acidissima of 



2 Urban, 1, 1905, Symb. antil., 4: 321, as Citrus Hystrix acida. 



^ Gmelin, S. G., 1774, Reise durch Russland, St. Petersburg, 3: 278-279. 



* Houttyun, Martin, 1774, Natuurlyke historic . . . , volgens het samen- 

 stel van den Heer Linnaeus, Amsterdam, Deel 2, 2: 444-445. 



" Rumphius, G. E., 1741, Herb, amboin., Amsterdam, 2: 107. tab. 29. 



^ Merian, Maria Sibylla, 1705, Metamorphosis insectorum surinamensium ofte 

 veranderung der surinaamschc insecten, Amsterdam, p. 17, pi. 17 (s. d. but pub- 

 lished 1705 vide Hagen, H. A., Bibl. Entom. 1: 534-535). As Houttuyn does not 

 specify the edition of Merian's work, it may be that he quotes from the second 

 Dutch edition, published in 1719. Color is given to this surmise by the fact that 

 the quotation made by Houttuyn differs by one word from the original text of 

 Juffrouw Merian as published in 1705. 



^ [Christmann, G. F.], 1777, in Linne, Pflanzensystem nach der vierzehnten 

 lateinischen Ausgabe und nach des hoUandischen Houttuynischen Werkes iiber- 

 setzt, Niirnberg, 1: 618. 



