SOME QUESTIONS OE NOMENCLATURE. 

 By Theodore Gill. 



INTRODUCTION. 



I had originally selected for tlie address which it is my duty and 

 privilege to give to-day a very different subject 2 from that which I am 

 now to discuss, but the renewed and lively interest which is being 

 manifested at present in the ever-troublous subject of nomenclature 

 has led me to take it as my theme. I have been especially influenced, 

 too, by the consideration that a committee was appointed at the last 

 zoological congress, held at Leyden, to consider the subject, and sug- 

 gestions have been asked for. 3 Of the multitudinous questions that 

 offer for review, time will only permit us to examine a few. 



Nomenclature, in the modern sense of the word, did not trouble nat- 

 uralists till near the middle of the last century. The animals and 

 plants of the ancient world were mostly treated of under the names 

 which the Greeks or Romans had used, or were supposed to have used. 

 The forms that became first known after the discovery of America were 

 introduced into the literature under names more or less like those which 

 they bore .among the aboriginal inhabitants of the countries from which 

 those forms had been obtained. Only a few names were coined from 

 the Latin or Greek, and used for forms not mentioned by classical 

 authors. Examples of such are Ammortytes and Anarrhichas, invented 



'Address by vice-president of section F (Zoology) at Buffalo meeting of the 

 American Association for the Advancement of Science, August, 1896. Printed in 

 Science, October 23, 1896, and in Proceedings of the Association, January, 1897. 



2 Animals as Chronometers for Geology. 



r -The Third International Zoological Congress (Leyden, Sept., 1895) appointed an 

 international commission of five members to study the various codes of nomencla- 

 ture in use in different countries. This commission is composed of Dr. Raphael 

 I Man chard (France), Professor Carus (Germany), Professor Jentink (Holland), Dr. 

 Sclater (England), and Dr. Stiles (United States). Dr. Stiles requested the appoint- 

 ment of an American advisory committee. This advisory committee has now been 

 completed and is made up as follows: 



"Dr. Gill, representing the National Academy of Sciences; Dr. Dall, representing 

 the Smithsonian Institution ; Professor Cope, representing the Society of Amer- 

 ican Naturalists; Professor Wright, representing the Royal Society of Canada; 

 Professor Packard, representing the American Association for the Advancement of 

 Science." 



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