Heath and Steppe, Macchia and Garigue

Abstract

Popular names are often very expressive and appropriate, and the Brussels Congress has voted in favour of their retention in phytogeography. However, Diels' arguments (in Flahault and Schroter, Phytogeographiscihe Nomenclatur, Ziirich, 1910) against the use of vernacular names are of considerable weight. Moreover, since the Congress was held (1910) the meanings of Flur, Hain and Trift, for instance, have not gained in uniformity: and in America the term chaparral, though in the strict sense colnfined to a definite community of evergreen Californian bushland, has been used by Clements and other writers for various kinds of bushlands, some very different from the Californian. The vernacular name not only gives rise to confusion in its application among travellers, geographers and others who are not experts in plant geography, but even anmong plant geographers themselves. Diels (loc. cit.) rightly remarks that if every nation continues to use the terms of its own language, then in future the expression of the larger relationships-the chief thing for universal sciencewill be lost. If the original meanings of some ternms were better known, perhaps the misuse of them would not be so great as it is now, though as a matter of fact I am rather sceptical about that. In any case, the terms are constantly used and we have to take them into consideration. Discussions on this subject were frequent during the Internatiolnal Phytogeographical Excursions of recent years, and it may be of interest to follow out a few of these terms and conisider in each case (1) the fornmal mneaning of the word, (2) how it found its way into the terminology of science in general and of plant geography in particular, (3) its use in different languages and language-groups and by different observers, anid (4) its value and the possible restrictions in its use which might lead to greater definiteness.