86 



The most astonishing statement in Professor Greene's paper is 

 that the earh"est case known to.him of the deHberate naming of a 

 second genus for one man was in 1850, when Kunth proposed 

 IVittia for the later of the two genera previously named Clintonia. 

 Further than this, and as if to emphasize it, he says that while 

 there may be earlier cases, he thinks not. This assertion, if per- 

 mitted to go unchallenged, coming as it does from a botanist 

 who is reputed to possess an unusual degree of familiarity with 

 the history of botanical names, would naturally be accepted as 

 authoritative by the casual reader. 



A precisely similar case, however, occurred twenty-five years 

 earlier. Escnbcckia H.B.K. (1825) and Escnbcckia Blume (1825) 

 were dedicated independently to the brothers Nees von Esen- 

 beck. Blume, discovering that his name was a homonym, 

 changed it to Neesia (1828) ; thus Escnbcckia H.B.K. and Necsia 

 Blume have come down to us side by side until the present day, 

 both of them universally recognized as valid genera. Neesia, 

 however, according to the newly discovered unwritten law, is not 

 valid ; it is surely not a " homonym " of Escnbcckia, and as the 

 discoverer of this law has not given us any word by which to 

 characterize such a name, perhaps we may be permitted to call 

 it a " chloronym." This word is so appropriate that it would 

 be superfluous to explain its derivation. It happens that Neesia 

 Blume (1828), besides being a chloronym of Escnbcckia H.B.K. 

 (1825), is a homonym of Necsia Spreng. (1818) ; and Escn- 

 bcckia H.B.K. (1825) is also a chloronym of this earlier Neesia ; 

 and finally, this first Neesia being a synonym of an earlier name, 

 by this bit of jugglery both of the time-honored names Necsia 

 and Escnbcckia disappear from view forever ! 



A few other chloronyms, earlier than the one cited by Professor 

 Greene as the first, may be mentioned here, the names of the 

 genera being preceded by the names of the persons to whom they 

 were dedicated. 



I. Rene Louiche Desfontaines. Louiclica L'Her. 1789. — 

 Fontanesia Labill. 1791. — Desfontainea R. & P. 1794. (It may 

 be worth mentioning that this last name was altered to Linkia by 

 Persoon, in 1805, because of Fontanesia, but this emendation was 

 rejected by nearly all of his contemporaries.) 



