Chapter I — 3 — Scope and Method 



botanical Studies of the Black-Soil Zone", in which the term "geo- 

 botanical" is used not in the broad sense in which it was employed by 

 Grisebach but in a narrower sense. By "geobotany" Ruprecht ap- 

 parently meant only that part of botanical geography which is con- 

 cerned with a study of the history of the distribution of species and the 

 development of floras or — as Litvinov (1895), the well-known specialist 

 on the problems we have under consideration in this book, expressed 

 it — with an elucidation "of the extent to which the age of a land is 

 reflected in the present distribution of plants". 



Later, geobotany came to mean only the interrelations between soil 

 and vegetation, i.e., the use of this term was narrowed down to em- 

 brace not all but only part of ecological plant geography. And, finally, 

 in recent times geobotany has come to mean the science dealing with 

 plant associations. In view of the great confusion in the use of this 

 term, it seems advisable to adopt some more concrete term. 



All the other names proposed likewise have their drawbacks. Eng- 

 ler's " Entwicklungsgeschichtliche Pflanzengeographie " — although it 

 comes closest to our concept, stressing precisely as it does problems of 

 the history of the development of floras — is exceedingly cumbrous and 

 difficult to translate into other languages. Diels' "genetische Pflan- 

 zengeographie" embraces only problems of the origin of floras and does 

 not reflect their historical development and present fate; also in sound 

 it very closely resembles an entirely different science, genetics, in which, 

 moreover, at the present time there has developed a special branch 

 known as "genogeography". The term "genetic plant geography" is 

 particularly inacceptable, because it stresses the initial moments in the 

 history of species and floras, entirely ignoring the dynamics of their 

 development and distribution. The task of historical plant geography 

 is to picture the distribution of plants not statically but as a historical 

 process. 



It is likewise erroneous to include in this branch of plant geography 

 only the genesis of the areas of species. Historical plant geography 

 aims to elucidate not only the origin and history of the distribution of 

 species but, to no less an extent and even as its chief task, the history 

 of the development of floras, and the genesis of floras may not at all 

 coincide either in place or time of origin with the genesis of many of 

 the species forming these floras. 



The term "historical plant geography" has its disadvantages, since 

 "history" is often understood as embracing only those events hnked 

 with the period of man's existence, and some botanical geographers 

 {e.g., Stromeyer, 1880, Historia vegetabilium geographica applicata; 

 Flahault, 1907, Phytogeographie historique) have limited this term 

 to designate only those changes in the plant world which have occurred 

 as a result of man's activities. 



Nevertheless, we adhere to this last term, "historical plant geog- 

 raphy", since we consider that for the given branch of botanical 

 geography, closely linked with historical geology, this is the most 

 suitable designation, being a concept broad enough to embrace all the 

 diverse tasks involved in a branch of knowledge concerned with a study 

 of the development of present-day vegetation in its historical and 

 geographical perspectives. 



