J43 
PLA.NTS USED MEDICIXALLY AT CARACAS. VENEZUELA, 
SOUTH AMERICA, AND THEIE VERNACULAR NAMES. 
By a. Ernst, Esq., op Caracas. 
In Venezuela a comparatively small number of plants have vernacular 
names, — the useful, poisonous, or in other respects remartable species, 
forming but a small fraction of the whole vegetation of the country. 
Most of our plants are therefore called " monte," a coUectiye name, 
corresponding nearly to the English slang term ''bush." As the in- 
digenous names are not without interest, I have made a list of them, 
and I should like to have added some philological remarks on the 
Indian ones, bvit the total want of any grammars or vocabularies has 
rendered this, for the present, out of the question. The Spaniards, 
"wherever they carried their victorious arms, invariably suppressed the 
languages of the natives. Thus, nobody had an interest in learning 
what was considered only as barbarous articulations condemned to 
extermination. True, grammars and vocabularies w^ere composed for 
the use of the friars going to the mission stations of the interior; 
but most of them became a prey to moisture, insects, or carelessness. 
In Venezuela a plant often bears very different vernacular names. I re- 
member meeting with three different names for Melia sempervirens^'wii'h- 
in a radius of thirty miles. The names of my list are generally collected 
in the neighbourhood of Caracas; w^hen this is not the case, I have 
added the locality in wliicli the name is current. The names I have 
collected are either of Indian or Spanish origin. At Caracas the Indian 
names are generally so corrupted, tliat tlieir original form could be 
traced onlv by a <i*ood Indian scholar, whilst in the interior, where the 
Spanish influence was less felt, many uncorrupted Indian names are 
still in use. The Spanish names may be divided in three classes ; 
1. Names introduced with the plants from Europe, as ''Agenjo," "Alba- 
haca," ''Ajo,'' 3- Names of European plants transferred to American 
ones, which in habit or use bore some resemblance to them, as, for in- 
stance, " Escorzonera " (Crassiolaria annua, Jacq.), "Reseda" (Law- 
sonia inermis, L.), "Apio" {ArracacJia esculenta, DC). 3. Names 
newly invented and not used for any plant before, sometimes having an 
intelligible meaning, but in most cases so far-fetched that one is at a 
