A dictionary of English names of plants applied in England and among English-speaking people to cultivated and wild plants, trees, and shrubs

1884·21.4 MB·English

by  Miller, William

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A
DICTIONARY
OP
ENGLISH NAMES OF PLANTS
APPLIED IN
ENGLAND AND AMONG ENGLISH-SPEAKING PEOPLE
TO
CULTIVATED AND WILD PLANTS, TREES, AND SHRUBS.
WI
By
LIBRARY
NEW YORK
i^O! ANJCAL
''Av-()RN
IN TWO PARTS. ENGLISH-LATIN AND LATIN-ENGLISH.
LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
1884.
—
M52
No one who hashadexperienceof the progress of Botany as a science
can doubt that ithas been moreimpeded in this country by the repulsive
appearance of the nameswhichitemploysthanbyany othercausewhatever,
andthat,infact, this hasproved aninvincible obstacle to its becoming the
serious occupationof thosewhoare unacquaintedwith thelearnedlanguages,
or wlio, being acquaintedwith them, are fastidiousabouteuphonyandGreek
orLatinpurity. Dr. Lindley.
Botany has this great practical advantage over all other sciences as a
meansofi^niversalculture,that thematerialsarethemostgenerallyaccessible
ofanyscientificmaterialintheworld Whatis needed is that its
terminology shouldbepopularised Historicallj'almostthe first of
sciences, botany isnaturally and eductionallyfirst in order tothe enquiring
mind. Its objectsarenearourhomes,awakening to our minds, and inviting
toourtouch. Botanyisadapted to bethe universal preparatory science, the
science toinfusethe scientificsense. "WTiy should we allow a pile of hetero-
geneous names to standas abarrierbetweenour peopleand thefairestgateof
knowledge? These strange namesareallbutbarren of interestinthemselves;
what interest they possess springs wholly out of the objectsthej-represent.
The objects and theirmutual relations might be learnt quite as effectually
through congenial names, if onlyone-thousandth part—of the labour that has
been expended on those were bestowed on these. Prof. Eaele, "English
Plant Kames," p. cix.
(/t
PEEFACE.
»^'^"
The compilation of this Dictionary was undertaken at the request of
Mr. W. Robinson, ofThe Garden newspaper, at whose expense the work
is pubhshed, he having advocated in his journal a more general use
of English names for the plants, trees, and shrubs which are commonly
grown in our gardens and pleasure-grounds, and who wished the
horticultural public to have at command a list of all such names now
appUed to these as well as to all other cultivated and useful plants in-
cluding our native flora and the native plants and trees of America and
the colonies.
It is an undeniable fact that the vast majority of people of all
classes who take an interest in horticultural pursuits consists of those
who, never having received any classical or botanical training, find it
difficult to learn and remember, and impossible to understand, the Latin
or scientific names by which plants are spoken of and described by
botanists. These names,howeveruseful and even necessary they may be
as technical terms to the systematic botanist,become a senselessjargon in
the vain attempt to fix them amongst our " household words,"and most
of us are keenly alive to the inconsistency of employing words from a
foreign and even dead language to name such familiar everyday objects
as the flowers and shrubs which are grown in our gardens and woods.
'Notwithstanding the copious use of Latin, it would be a grievous mistake
to suppose that Enghsh names do not exist for most of our cultivated
plants, the fact being that such names do exist, and abundantly, many of
them dating back to the days of Spenser, Shakespeare, Gerard, and
— —
Parkinson nearly 800 years ago although they have now fallen into
disuse, and are only to be met with in books, in consequence of what the
Rev. John Earle, in his excellent littlevolume on "English Plant Names,"
terms " the gratuitous rejection of good native names in favour of some
Latin name, through mere contempt for homelythings and affectation of
novelty." Nofartherback,mdeed, than thecommencement ofthepresent
century,it would appear that, evenamongst gardeners,itwas the ordinary
—
IV PREFACE.
custom to Speak ofplants by their English names, as we find the poet
Crabbe thus describing an exceptional case
:
Higli-sounding words our worthy gardener gets,
And at Ills club to wondering swains repeats ;
He there of Jthus and Rhododendron speaks,
And Allium calls his Onions and his Leeks.
There Arums, there Leontodons we view,
And Artemisia grows where Wormwood grew.
(Crabbe's "Parish Register," PartI., Baptisms.)
and there can be little doubt that many good old English plant-names
which, happily, are still preserved to us in books, have been gradually
ousted from popular use and sacrificed for Latin terms, not from any
conviction that these were better or more appropriate, but simply
through the spread of the craze for "high-sounding words." To quote
Mr. Earle further, "The adoption of classical words Avas in deference to
the prestige of the classical languages at first, then it became a piece of
scholastic j)edantry which, spreading ever wider and wider, became at
length a fashion because itwas a flag of social pretension." —
A botanist writes in The Garden (vol. xxiii., p. 403) : "But what
do we see in popular naming ? . . . . The whole business
breeds nothing but confusion, as if there was not enough already in the
same direction." Such a remark comes with a peculiarly bad grace from
a scientific botanist, and may be regarded as a stone thrown by one who
lives in aglass houseofrather extensive dimensions, whenAveconsiderthe
deplorable condition of his own pet nomenclature in this respect. There
is, in fact, no greater stumbling-block and no more torturing embarrass-
ment in the way ofthe botanical student than the swarms of synonyms
which beset him at almost every step and, like the aliases of a culprit
who is "wanted," serve rather to conceal than to point out the subjects
to which they are aj^plied. The whole family of the Conifeiae, for in-
stance, is almostsmothered in thisway, as anyone may see who chooses
to look into the last edition of Gordon's "Pinetum," Avhere he will find
that nearly all the trees there described have a greater or less number
of synonyms applied to them, severalofthem as many ashalf-a-dozen or
more apiece The practical results of this extreme plurality of scientific
!
synonyms are Avell exemplified by an instance which occurred last year,
when a correspondent of The Garden wrote to the effect that "The
Bluebell of Scotland is Agraphis nutans," and that " the English Blue-
bell is Hyacinthus non-scriptus " (The Garden forJune 9, 1888, p. 523),
in evident ignorance that the two names are synonymous for the same
plant, Avhich lias yet the tAvo other synonyms of Scilla nutans and
Hyacinthus anglicus.
Many of the ncAv names Avhich have appeared in The Garden
were absolutely needed for pjlants Avhich previously had no popular