An Essay on Nomenclature [ 7 



The bacteriological code is for the most part a condensation of an earlier edition 

 of the botanical code. It includes the odd feature that the name of a genus of bacteria 

 is to be changed if it had previously been used either among plants or among Protozoa. 

 Since there is an earlier Phytomonas among flagellates, bacteriologists have given a 

 new name to the bacterium Phytomonas. The avoidance of homonyms which they 

 desire will not, however, be attained: no zoologist will allow a new name for the 

 flagellate Klebsiella on account of an earlier Klebsiella among bacteria. 



The grounds upon which these things are treated as wrong are provided by a 

 passage in the botanical laws of 1867 which is believed to define the legitimate 

 authority of congresses and codes: 



"Les regies de la nomenclature ne pouvent etre ni arbitraires ni imposees. Elles 

 doivent etre bassees sur des motifs assez clairs et assez forts pour que chacun les 

 comprenne et soit dispose a les accepter." 



It is implied by this statement that principles, appealing to the reason and found 

 sound by the trial of experience, were in existence when it was written; and this is 

 the truth. By this statement, the legitimate powers of congresses are those of courts 

 of common law, which avoid the explicit making of law, but discover the law, inter- 

 pret it, and apply it. Congresses and codes may legitimately (a) state explicitly 

 corollaries of the principles when they are not obvious; and (b) determine arbitrarily 

 matters which are necessarily determined arbitrarily, not being within the range of 

 principle. One would not in theory deny a power (c) to validate breaches of principle 

 when these are of an expedience verging on necessity; but its use by botanical con- 

 gresses to produce a roll of exceptions of twice the bulk of the text of the code leads 

 one to doubt the expedience of this admission. It has been through failure to recog- 

 nize the legitimate limits of their powers — through a conception that their powers 

 are sovereign or plenary — that international congresses have come to enact codes 

 conflicting with each other and giving incomplete satisfaction in themselves. 



Under these circumstances, a nomenclature of superior legitimacy can be applied 

 in groups treated as removed from the jurisdiction of the codes. Not without diffi- 

 dence, this assumption is extended to the bacteria; it will be agreed that the nomen- 

 clatural practice applied to the bacteria must be the same as that which is applied 

 to the blue-green algae. 



Here one attempts a brief formulation of those principles, appealing to reason 

 and proven sound in practice, to which all nomenclature must conform. 



1. Scientific names are words of the Latin language. They are not "of Latin form" 

 or "construed as Latin"; they are Latin. This is to treat Latin as a living language and 

 scientific names as subject to the rules of its grammar. They are not code-designa- 

 tions, nor words of any language or none, as chemical names are. 



2. The name of a group of the kind called a genus is a proper noun in the singular. 

 Linnaeus replaced all generic names which were adjectives; all of us his successors 

 should do likewise. 



3. The names of groups of genera are proper nouns, or adjectives used as proper 

 nouns, in the plural. 



The foregoing principles are of pre-Linnaean origin; beginning with his first sig- 

 nificant work (1735), Linnaeus took them for granted. For the principle next to be 

 stated, authority is the practice of Linnaeus in later works (1753 and subsequently) : 



4. The name of a species consists of the name of the genus to which it belongs fol- 

 lowed by one epithet, ordinarily an adjective, occasionally a noun in apposition or 

 in the genitive. 



