428 
Telopea 9(2): 2001 
= Pyrus malus L. var. rubelliana L., Sp. PL: 479 (1753). 
Type: see above. 
-Pyrus malus L. var. cavillea L., Sp. PI. ed. 2,1: 686 (1762). 
Type: see above. 
= Malus communis Desf. var. cavillea (L.) Desf., l.c. 
[= P. cavillea (L.) Steud., Nomencl. Bot.: 670 (1821), nom. in synon.] 
= M. domestica Borkh. var. cavillea (L.) Likh., FI. Kul't SSSR 14: 65 (1983). 
= (? Malus vulgaris Pallas, Reise 3: 653 (1776), nom. nud.] 
= Pyrus sieversii Ledeb., FI. Alt. 2: 222 (1830). 
Type: 'Siberia', [1790-4], /.£. Sievers s.n. (LE?, n.v.). 
= Malus sieversii (Ledeb.) M. Roem., Syn. 3: 216 (1847). 
Native in Central Asia, M. pumila is now much restricted in the wild, but selected 
forms have been carried throughout the temperate world as orchard apples and 
become naturalised widely. Wildings in Europe include trees named in Floras M. 
acerba Merat, for example. 
It was the habit of early European voyagers to Australia to plant seeds of European 
crops, so that apple seeds may well have been sown before the First Fleet arrived in 
1788. Cultivars growing in England about the time of the Fleet are listed in Weston 
(1775: 220), but others introduced to Australia then or before could have been picked 
up at ports of call on the voyages from Europe. Those apples likely to have been 
brought by the Fleet (Surrey Jacobs, NSW, pers. comm.) include M. pumila 'Court- 
Pendu Plat' (see above), still grown, and 'French Crab', from which arose 'Granny Smith'. 
Conclusion 
The foregoing demonstrates how intricate ascertaining the correct nomenclature for 
economic plants can be. In recent years there has been much ink spilled in ascertaining 
the correct name in Lycopersicon (Solanaceae) for the common tomato, L. esculentum 
Mill, (see Terrell et al„ 1983), but all that has now been superseded in that the tomato 
has been returned to where Linnaeus had it — in Solanum, so that it is now 
S. lycopersicum L. once more (Spooner et al., 1993). Similarly, although Malus pumila is 
now, once again, seen to be the correct name in Malus for the common apple, it is likely 
that the narrowly defined genera of this group coming from folk taxonomy (Walters 
1961), will also ultimately be recombined following phylogenetic work. In this case, 
the folk taxonomy was enshrined, for example, by Toumefort (as in citrus fruit 
[Mabberley 1997b] and the strawberry and its allies: Potentilla to include Fragaria), then 
rejected by Linnaeus, and later resurrected by Miller, Medikus and Jussieu. 
In following the re-amalgamation of the other Rosaceous genera Amygdalus L., 
Armeniaca Scop., Cerasus Mill., Laurocerasus Duham., Pad us Mill, and Persica Mill., into 
Prunus L., so that the name of the almond is once more referred to Primus, as P. dulcis 
(Mill.) D.A. Webb, and that of the peach becomes P. persica L. once more, the name of 
the apple would then revert to just what Linnaeus (and most early C20 authors 
including Church) had — Pyrus malus L., or even Sorbus malus (L.) Crantz, with 
concomitant changes in the names of other species presently accommodated in Malus. 
