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{{harv|Stearn 1992|ref=Stearn|p. 6}}) [It is the Latin chosen by Linnaeus for the purpose of descriptions, and, I dare to say, for the use of those who love neither grammatical complications nor meaningless sentences.]

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.

William T. Stearn wrote:{{harv|Stearn 1992|ref=Stearn|p. 6–7}}

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.

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.{{citation |author=The Angiosperm Phylogeny Group |year=2016 |title=An update of the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group classification for the orders and families of flowering plants: APG IV |journal=Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society |volume=181 |issue=1 |pages=1–20 |doi=10.1111/boj.12385|doi-access=free }}

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.

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.{{harv|Stearn 1992|ref=Stearn|chapter=Pronunciation|p. 49–51}}{{harv|McNeill et al. 2012|ref=ICN2011|Article 60.4}} Diacritics are not used in names, and a dieresis is considered an optional mark that does not affect spelling.{{harv|McNeill et al. 2012|ref=ICN2011|Article 60.6}}

{{see also|Syllable stress of Botanical Latin}}

Some English speakers, and some speakers of other languages, use the reconstructed pronunciation guide for Classical Latin when speaking Botanical Latin words. Latin names pronounced by gardeners and English botanists usually follow a system close to English. It differs greatly from classical pronunciation, and also from Ecclesiastical Latin pronunciation (which is based on Italian, and has, for example, c before i or e pronounced as ch).

Every vowel is pronounced, except diphthongs, which are treated as single long vowels.

In classical Latin words of several syllables the stress falls on the syllable next to the last one (the penultimate) when this syllable is long ... e.g., for-mō'-sus, or when two consonants separate the two last vowels, e.g., cru-ěn'-tus ... on the last syllable but two (the antepenultimate) when the last but one is short, e.g. flō-ri-dus.

"These rules cannot satisfactorily be applied to all generic names and specific epithets commemorating persons. About 80 per cent of generic names and 30 per cent of specific epithets come from languages other than Latin and Greek. A simple and consistent method of pronouncing them does not exist."{{harv|Stearn 1992|ref=Stearn|chapter=Pronunciation|p. 53}}

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.

{{see also|Traditional English pronunciation of Latin}}

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.{{CN|date=August 2020}}

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• Finding derivations /meanings for epithets. See, e.g.,: [http://www.plantillustrations.org/epithet.php?id_epithet=208720&mobile=0 Plantillustrations.org: gracilis,-is,-e "slender", "thin", "graceful"] (Site does not always give a derivation)
• [http://www.mobot.org/mobot/LatinDict/search.aspx A Grammatical Dictionary of Botanical Latin (www.mobot.org)]
• [https://www.iapt-taxon.org/nomen/main.php?page=title International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Shenzhen Code) 2018]

• Stearn, W.T. (2004) "Botanical Latin" (4th ed), Timber Press, Portland Oregon. {{ISBN|9780881926279}}
• Backer, C.A. (1936) [https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/back062verk02_01/back062verk02_01_0001.php 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...)
• {{cite book|last1=Brown|first1=R.W.|title=The Composition of Scientific Words|date=1956|publisher=Smithsonian Institution Press|location=Washington, D.C.}}
• [https://books.google.com/books?id=dFcKLxqEAj4C George, A. & Short, E. (2013) "A Primer of Botanical Latin with Vocabulary"] Cambridge University Press

• Philosophia Botanica 1751, by Linnaeus, described as "The first textbook of descriptive systematic botany and botanical latin."{{harv|Stearn 1992|ref=Stearn|p. 35}}
• Syllable stress of Botanical Latin

{{reflist}}

• {{cite book |author1=McNeill, J. |author2=Barrie, F.R. |author3=Buck, W.R. |author4=Demoulin, V. |author5=Greuter, W. |author6=Hawksworth, D.L. |author7=Herendeen, P.S. |author8=Knapp, S. |author9=Marhold, K. |author10=Prado, J. |author11=Prud'homme Van Reine, W.F. |author12=Smith, G.F. |author13=Wiersema, J.H. |author14=Turland, N.J. |year=2012 |volume=Regnum Vegetabile 154 |title=International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Melbourne Code) adopted by the Eighteenth International Botanical Congress Melbourne, Australia, July 2011 |publisher=A.R.G. Gantner Verlag KG |isbn=978-3-87429-425-6 |url=http://www.iapt-taxon.org/nomen/main.php?page=title |ref=ICN2011}}
• {{cite book|last1=Stearn|first1=William T.|author-link=WT Stearn|title=Botanical Latin: history, grammar, syntax, terminology and vocabulary|date=1992|orig-year=1966|publisher=Timber Press|location=Portland, Or.|isbn=9780881923216|edition=4th|url=https://archive.org/details/botanicallatin00will|url-access=registration|access-date=19 February 2015|ref=Stearn}}

Category:Languages attested from the 18th century

Category:Botanical nomenclature

Category:Botany

Category:Forms of Latin