8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 98 



Cocos Island palm in southern Florida, Puerto Rico, or the Canal 

 Zone, should the seedlings attain the transplanting stage. Permanent 

 soil moisture is needed, of course, for any palms from humid tropical 

 forests. All the hardy types of palms are adapted to open conditions, 

 and do not thrive in the forest or under shade. 



EUTERPE A TRADITIONAL NAME OF CABBAGE PALMS 



The generic name Euterpe, used by Martius and subsequent writers 

 for this group of palms, was borrowed without warrant from an East 

 Indian genus not represented in America. The first specific name, 

 Euterpe globosa, was proposed by Gaertner in 1792 for a palm de- 

 scribed and figured in 1741 as Pinanga sylvestris globosa by Rum- 

 phius in the "Hortus Amboinensis," an important early work that 

 served as the basis of many binomial names assigned by later writers. 

 The failure of Gaertner to mention any specimen or locality leaves 

 the name attached to the Amboina palm. The fruit is described and 

 figured by Gaertner with an apical point, erect mesocarp fibers, and a 

 lateral embryo, characters that do not appear in the American palms. 



Martius recognized his mistake before the second volume of his 

 "Historia Naturalis Palmarum" was completed, and directed in the 

 index that the reference to Gaertner be suppressed. In his third vol- 

 ume he placed Gaertner's genus Euterpe as a synonym under the 

 Malayan genus Areca, though continuing to use "Euterpe Mart." for 

 the American palms. Also in the "Palmetum Orbignianum," pub- 

 lished in 1847, Martins says "Euterpe Mart, non Gaertn." In the 

 time of Martius it was customary for botanical authorities to modify 

 definitions and change the applications of names in an arbitrary man- 

 ner, instead of holding the names to their original applications, as is 

 now considered necessary. 



The transfer by Martius of the name Euterpe to South America 

 occasioned the proposal by Blume in 1836 of a second name, Calyp- 

 trocalyx spicatus, for the same palm that Rumphius had described and 

 Gaertner had called Euterpe globosa. Several other Oriental palms 

 have simple inflorescences and globose seeds, and Gaertner may have 

 seen some of these. A second species, Euterpe pisifera, established by 

 Gaertner on a seed of unknown origin, also was identified by Martius 

 with a Brazilian palm, but Gaertner's drawing of Euterpe pisifera has 

 been identified by Herr Burret with Heterospathe data, another East 

 Indian palm, so that no occasion remains for further association of 

 the name Euterpe with American palms. 



Methods of classifying and naming plants have been profoundly 

 altered since the work of Darwin gained credence for the idea of 



