SOME NEURAL TERMS. 1 49 



from his criticisms of medipedmiciilus. Perhaps, therefore, the 

 simplest and most comprehensive rejoinder is to recapitulate 

 briefly the several attributes of the term, leaving each reader 

 to estimate their value for himself. 



{a) Brevity, {b) Latin form, {c) It is a mononym. {d) It 

 is a locative name, {e) It is an adjectival locative. (/) It is 

 capable of inflection; i.e., postcavalis, postcaval, postcavals. 

 {g) Its various national representatives (paronyms, p. 117) 

 differ little or none from the international antecedent. {Ji) It 

 has in the derivative, postcaval, high authority (Richard Owen) 

 and moderate antiquity (1862 or earlier). (?) It is an idionym, 

 and not likely to be applied to any other part in any vertebrate. 

 {k) It is sufficiently euphonious, and easily remembered. (/) Like 

 other euphonious and easily remembered mononyms it consti- 

 tutes no bar to the progress of one who may never have heard 

 the more common polyonyms. Those who are familiar with those 

 polyonyms, whether vena cava inferior, vena cava ascendcns, or 

 vena cava posterior, could hardly fail to recognize its significa- 

 tion. Since 1881 no other term than postcava has been used 

 by me for the great vein in question. I have yet to learn of a 

 single instance of misapprehension or other difficulty caused 

 thereby among either general or special students. 



There remains the question of the etymologic orthodoxy of 

 postcava, and this involves the much more comprehensive and 

 difficult question as to the definition of etymologic orthodoxy. 

 Without presuming to invade the jurisdiction of philologic 

 experts, for the practical discussion of the case in point 

 precedents need be sought in only two periods, the classic and 

 the recent. 



I freely admit that there is known to me no instance in 

 classic Latin literature of the employment of post, whether 

 alone or in composition, with the force of an adjective and as 

 equivalent to posterns ox posterior. That this negative evidence 

 is hardly conclusive may be seen from a single case among the 

 scores that might be adduced. With the Romans item was 

 an adverb. With us it is not only an adverb, but also a 

 noun and a verb, and the basis of two derivatives, itemize and 

 itemizer. 



