269 



ON TRINOMIALISM IN ZOOLOGY. 

 By H. T. Whakton, M.A., F.Z.S., &c. 



The burning question of nomenclature among zoologists at the present moment is 

 that which is called "trinomialism." It is one that has lately been strongly taken 

 up by American ornithologists ; and they are concerned with such a vast extent of 

 territory, and their influence, born of their energy and scientific attainments, is so 

 great, that its consideration in Europe cannot be long delayed. Having been 

 akeady adopted by Mr. P. L. Sclater in his "Review of the Species of the Family 

 Icteridse " in recent numbers of the Ibis, its acceptance probably by the whole 

 scientific world is merely a question of time. So that the sooner we ponder the 

 faith that we shall inevitably embrace, the better it will be for us. 



Th<; (juestion, as it stands at present, is a tolerably simple one. We might 

 have adopted it in Europe long ago, if we had only understood it better. The 

 presence among us now of the well-known American ornithologist. Dr. Elliott 

 Coues, makes its consideration at the present time the more desirable. 



Before the epoch ot Linnaeus it had been the practice of writers on that which 

 was vaguely called "natural history" to use names for species in the same in- 

 definite way as they are popularly employed at present ; where, that is, they did 

 not use the still more objectionable method of denoting a species by a whole 

 cumbrous descriptive sentence. For instance, the name " sparrow," as applied to 

 the familiar bird of the streets of London, refers, and is referred in London and 

 by Londoners, to a single definite species (Passer domesticus) ; but in country 

 parts of England the name connotes another species also (Passer montanus), not 

 to mention that which is generally distinguished as the hedge-sparrow (Accentor 

 modularis) ; and in other countries its connotation becomes still wider. Hence an 

 author, describing the birds of the world, must limit the name "sparrow" to a 

 certain individual form which can easily be described and identified. 



This difficulty became conspicuously apparent to Linnaeus when he attempted 

 to systematise the description and appellation of every known form of animal and 

 vegetable life. And he solved the question by giving every species two names— a 

 family, or generic name, and a subordinate or specific name, just as we might 

 say Smith, John, or Smith, William, for brief distinction's sake. That was 

 "binomialism." 



Linnffius's practice was found so convenient by his successors that it became 

 almost an article of faith among them. Instead of one vague name, or a sentence 

 which was simply a more or less short description, naturalists were agreed to call 

 every kind of animal or vegetable by a combined generic and specific name. And 

 in doing so they established a valuable principle, for they showed that names were 

 not essentially in any way descriptive words, but simply a convenient means of 

 making possible the indexing of a connotation of attributes. Similarly, in real 

 life, there are many John Smiths, but Linnaeus would describe only one as the 



