The meaning of generic names of important economic plants

Abstract

With the increase in the number of university and other courses in economic botany and with governments as well as industrial and pharmaceutical firms devoting more and more attention to useful plants, the technical names of those species most important in human affairs will become of increasing consequence. It is always interesting, and in many ways it makes this technical nomenclature more meaningful, to have an understanding of the origins of terminology. International codes of botanical nomenclature have become refined enough so that the generic names of the economically important plants are now rather well standardized. My interest in presenting these etymologies has been to make available the derivations -some of them exceedingly complex-of the generic names of only the most notable of our useful species, namely, those of enough significance to be included in Hill's Economic Botany (11). I have chosen Hill not only because it is a scholarly work of unusually wide scope, but also because it is the most widely used economic botany text in the United States. The list in Hill could easily be expanded many times if plants of minor importance were included. The most probable etymology is given. If no derivation was indicated in the original description, my own judgment was used to arrive at the most likely origin. I wish to express my gratitude to Dr. Richard Evans Schultes for his many suggestions and for his encouragement; and to Mrs. Lazella Schwarten, librarian of the Gray Herbarium and Arnold Arboretum, for her genial help in locating many original or obscure descriptions.