226 



NATURE 



\yan. 9, 1890 



purids are decidedly simpler, even if less euphonious, than Primu- 

 laceas, Euphorbiacese, Zygophyllacese, and Haloragefe ; yet the 

 longer Latin terms are still universally used, while the quasi- 

 English ones have never obtained even temporary acceptance " 

 (Journal of Botany). 



The last of these criticisms appears to rest on a confusion 

 between the principles of nomenclature and those of terminology. 

 In nomenclature, rigid rules have been laid down, and accepted 

 by all leading naturalists of all countries, in order that the 

 scientific names of species, genera, orders, &c., may correspond in 

 scientific treatises in all languages. In the terminology of 

 flowering plants no such rule has ever been attempted to be laid 

 down ; but each writer, when writing in his own language, uses 

 terms, usually of classical origin, and derived from common roots, 

 but of a form as far as possible amenable to the laws of the 

 language in which he writes. All that we are contending for is 

 the extension of the same principle to cryptogamic botany ; one 

 of the main objects in the publication of our *' Hand-book " being 

 to make the study of flowerless plants as attractive to the public 

 at large as is that of flowering plants. 



In order to show how recent is the universal adoption of this 

 practice in phanerogamic botany — a change largely due to the 

 influence of Dr. Lindley's writings — we append a list of a few 

 terms in use in standard works of original research or of reference, 

 published within the last thirty-two years, which presented 

 themselves the first to our hand ; viz. — " The Miscellaneous 

 Botanical Works of Robert Brown" (1866) ; Mr. Currey's 

 translation of " Hofmeister on the Higher Cryptogamia, &c." 

 (1872); Berkeley's "Introduction to Cryptogamic Botany" 

 (1857) ; and Bentley's " Manual of Botany " (2nd ed., 1870) : — 



Achcenium 



Ant Jura 



Arillus 



Bractea 



Carpellum 



Integitmentum 



Involucrum 



Ovarium 



Bentley 



Brown 



Bentley 



Brown 



Brown 



Berkeley 



Brown 



Brown 



Ovulum Brown 



Perianthinin Brown 



Pericarpium Brown 



Pistillnm Brown 



Rhizoma Berkeley 



Spermatozoon Currey 

 Stamini (plural) Brown 



Slipula Currey 



With the exception of words which have been incorporated 

 into our language, such as corolla, nucleus, Sec, comparatively 

 few of those used in describing flowering plants now retain their 

 classical forms ; the most conspicuous exceptions being those 

 applied to the structure of tissues, such as epidermis and those 

 ending in enchyma ; and can anything be more puzzling than 

 the forms in common use for the terms derived from the Greek 

 Se'p/ia — -epidermis, hypoderma, and periderm ? We have no 

 doubt that, had our critic lived in the days of Robert Brown 

 and Lindley, he would have thought all the innovations intro- 

 duced by the latter "uncouth" simply because we were not 

 used to them; and would have said that Lindley had "gone 

 much too far." In some of those adopted by ourselves we have, 

 in fact, been forestalled by others, as in the cases of antherid and 

 archegone by Lindley, and sporange by Oliver. 



We now come to the charge made by our critic in the 

 Academy, that the terms we have introduced would 

 "puzzle foreigners." Unfortunately, our polyglottism, or rather 

 oligoglottism, will not allow us to vie with our reviewer in his 

 acquaintance with every European language ; we are compelled 

 to confine ourselves chiefly to three ; but these include by far 

 the greater part of European botanical literature —in fact, every 

 treatise which nine out of ten English readers will wish to con- 

 sult in the original. The statement quoted above seems to have 

 been rashly made. 



In Italian, as far as our knowledge goes, the practice is 

 absolutely uniform : no botanical writer of repute uses the 

 classical forms ; but every technical term has its Italian spelling 

 and termination. To such an extent is this adaptation to the 

 laws of orthography of the language carried, that we find 

 "xylem" converted into xilema, "phloem "into floema, 

 " hormogonium " into ormogonio, and " hyphce " into ife ; and 

 this by the first writers " on special subjects." 



Our acquaintance with Swedis/i, Danish, Dutch, and Spanish 

 is too slight to allow us to speak with confidence ; but in all 

 these the general practice is, we believe, the same as in Italian, 

 though not to the same extent ; with the best writers, when 

 writing in their own language, the use of terms with Latin or 

 Greek terminations appears to be the exception rather than the 

 rule. 



In French, the practice is by no means so uniform as in 



Italian ; but still that of the highest authorities is, on the whole, 

 very decidedly in favour of French, rather than Latin or Greek, 

 forms of the words in most common use. From works picked 

 up almost at random, we select the following : — 



Anthiridie Van Tieghem, 

 Guignard, Philibert, De 

 Wildeman, Bornet, Thuret. 



Archegone Van Tieghem. 



Baside Tulasne, Rou- 



meguere [basidie, Fayod). 



Capiiicle Bornet. 



Conidie Costantin, Rou- 



meguere {conid, Bornet). 



Parenchynie Guignard, Hec- 

 kel, Fayod, Bornet, 

 Tulasne. 



Pcrithcce Costantin. 



Pollinide (Floridese) Guignard. 



Procarpe Bornet, Thuret. 



Propagate Bornet. 



Prothalle Guignard. 



Pycnide Costantin, Rou- 



The great stronghold of the conservatives in terminology is 

 the Ger?nan language. No doubt a large mumber of the best 

 writers do here maintain the classical form of most technical 

 cryptogamic terms, including some in which it has already been 

 abandoned with us, such as conceptaculutn, receptaculum, 

 stolo, and per-ianthium, just as we still meet with ovarium, 

 ovulum, and protoplasma. This is no doubt largely due to the 

 greater difficulty which the German language has than the 

 French or our own in naturalizing aliens. But even here the 

 practice is by no means uniform, and Germanized forms are 

 coming yearly more and more into use. In order that there may 

 be no question as to the recency and authority of the examples 

 quoted, the following list has been compiled exclusively from the 

 standard treatises in Schenk's " Handbuch der Botanik" ; had 

 other works of equal authority been consulted, the list might 

 have been considerably extended : — 



Hormogon Zopf 

 My eel Zimmermann 



Paraphyse Zopf 

 Parencliym Haberlandt, Zim- 

 mermann, Detmer, Schenk, 

 Zopf 

 Plasmod Zopf 



Prokarp Falkenberg 



Sklerenchym Haberlandt, Det- 

 mer, Schenk 

 Sporogon Goebel 



We do not mean that these words are exclusively used by the 

 writers quoted ; it is not uncommon to find the Latin and the 

 German form used indifferently on the same page. It is note- 

 worthy also that even the most rigid conservatives do not use the 

 Latin form in the plural of such words as "oogonium," "sporan- 

 gium, " ' ' antheridium, " ' ' sclerotium, " &c. , but always the German 

 lorms, Oogonien, Sporangien, Antheridien, Sklerotien, &c. ; such 

 words as "oogonia," "sporangia," "antheridia," "sclerotia," 

 &c., are, as far as our experience goes, to be found only in 

 English and American writings and in Latin diagnoses. 



Analyzing, therefore, the statement that the Latin and Greek 

 forms of words used in cryptogamic terminology are "familiar 

 in every treatise hitherto written on the special subject in any 

 European language," we find that in Italian the practice is 

 unanimously, and in French (as also, we believe, in most other 

 European languages) preponderatingly in the opposite direction ; 

 and that German is the only widely read language of Continental 

 Europe in which even the weight of authority is still on that 

 side. 



There are some terms in which, no doubt, the classical form 

 must be retained, especially those which, when deprived of their 



