Botanical Latin

Alphonse Pyramus de Candolle described the language in 1880: C'est le latin arrangé par Linné à l'usage des descriptions et, j'oserai dire, à l'usage de ceux qui n'aiment ni les complications grammaticales, ni les phrases disposées sens desus dessous." (Quoted by W. T. Stearn) [It is Latin chosen by Linnaeus to use in descriptions, and, I dare say, for use by those who like neither grammatical complications nor sentences turned upside-down.] De Candolle estimated that to learn Botanical Latin would take three months' work for an English speaker not already familiar with any language of Latin origin, and one month for an Italian. Botanical Latin is best described as a modern Romance language of special technical application, derived from Renaissance Latin with much plundering of ancient Greek, which has evolved, mainly since 1700 and primarily through the work of Carl Linnaeus (1707–78), to serve as an international medium for the scientific naming of plants in all their vast numbers and manifold diversity. These include many thousands of plants unknown to the Greeks and Romans of classical times and for which names have had to be provided as a means of reference. Their description necessitates the recording of structures often too small for comprehension by the naked eye, hence unknown to the ancients and needing words with precise restricted applications foreign to classical Latin. ==Orthography of taxon names==

Latin names of organisms are generally used in English without alteration, but some informal derivatives are used as common names. For example, the -idae ending of subclass names is changed to -ids (e.g., Rosidae produces rosids); the subfamily ending -oideae is changed to -oids (e.g., Papilionoideae produces papilionoids). The -ids common names have, however also been adopted as rankless clade names, sometimes containing further -ids clade names, so that, for example, in the APG IV classification, rosids contain both fabids and malvids. More extensive modifications to the spelling and pronunciation are routinely used in some other languages. French organism names are usually gallicized. For example: Chlorophyceae becomes Chlorophycées; Portulacineae becomes Portulacinées. Alphabet The Pre-Classical Latin alphabet consisted of 21 letters, to which y and z were added in the Classical epoch, w was later added, and the vowel/consonant pairs i and j, u and v, were later separated. This 26-letter alphabet is used for taxon names in Botanical Latin. Diacritics are not used in names, and a dieresis is considered an optional mark that does not affect spelling. ==Pronunciation==

Some English speakers, and some speakers of other languages, use the reconstructed pronunciation guide for Classical Latin when speaking Botanical Latin words. The rules also create difficulties with the -ii and -iae endings derived from personal names, because the stress falls in a place that is not usual for those names. English pronunciation The following table is simplified from Stearn 1992. The pronunciation transcriptions for medical terminology in major medical dictionaries, such as Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary and ''Stedman's Medical Dictionary'', match these values. ==Resources==

Online • Finding derivations /meanings for epithets. See, e.g.,: Plantillustrations.org: gracilis,-is,-e "slender", "thin", "graceful" (Site does not always give a derivation) • A Grammatical Dictionary of Botanical Latin (www.mobot.org) • International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Shenzhen Code) 2018 Books • Stearn, W.T. (2004) "Botanical Latin" (4th ed), Timber Press, Portland Oregon. • Backer, C.A. (1936) Verklarend woordenboek der wetenschappelijke namen van de in Nederland en Nederlandsch-Indië in het wild groeiende en in tuinen en parken gekweekte varens en hoogere planten (Edition Nicoline van der Sijs). (Explanatory dictionary of the scientific names of .. plants grown in the Netherlands and the Dutch East Indies...) • • George, A. & Short, E. (2013) "A Primer of Botanical Latin with Vocabulary" Cambridge University Press ==See also==