68 Frederic E. Clements 



gard the Latin of Linne as the model. In Greek, a large num- 

 ber of incorrect spellings have arisen from the careless practice 

 of dropping one or more letters at the end of a word, or from 

 the arbitrary change of the termination. The names of The- 

 ophrastus and Dioscorides, especially, have suffered mutilation, 

 and should be restored to the original form, while the correction 

 of later misspellings should be made upon the basis of the classi- 

 cal form of the terms of the compound. In the rare cases in 

 which the spelling of a Greek word has been changed in Latin, 

 the Greek form should prevail. 



VI 



Terms are invalid If they exceed six syllables in length; retroactively, the 

 correction of sesquipedalian words must never take place by contraction or 

 mutilation. 



"Nomina Generica Sesquipedalia, enunciatu dimcilia, vel naus- 

 eosa, fugienda sunt." Critica Botanica 133. 



The practice of biologists with respect to the formation of ex- 

 tremely long terms has been so exemplary that the present rule 

 scarcely requires postulation. Its justification may be found in 

 the fact that inconveniently long words, more or less frequent a 

 century ago, still appear occasionally, and that such words, if 

 there were no definite sentiment or legislation against them, 

 might again become frequent as the supply of primitives and 

 short compounds becomes exhausted. It is more or less unsatis- 

 factory to limit the length of a word by the number of syllables, 

 since these vary greatly in length in different stems, but this is 

 undoubtedly better than limitation by the number of letters. It 

 is a question whether nomenclature would not gain more than it 

 would lose, if the maximum length of words were placed at five 

 syllables, though the number of changes necessitated would prob- 

 ably render such a rule inacceptable. Naturally, the present rule 

 should not be made operative in the case of names of groups 

 above the genus. 



68 



