INTERNATIONAL CODE OF BOTANICAL NOMENCLATURE AND LITHUANIAN TERMINOLOGY

At present, science knows of about 300,000 fossil species and about 1,800,000 living species of organisms; among them, approximately 400,000 species are traditionally called plants, i.e. algae, mosses, vascular cryptogams, flowering plants, lichens, etc. (Kუტorga 1997: 7). As research expands, organisms previously unknown to science are discovered, described, and named. Thus, botanical nomenclature faces stringent requirements for assigning new names to plants and regulating the use of names for existing taxa¹.

Plant names help us find information about a given plant, its properties, and its uses for human needs. Botanical nomenclature is particularly important for maintaining international scientific communication; it helps preserve the unity and stability of scientific plant names. Only by following the same nomenclatural standards can all botanists use the same unambiguous names for the same taxon. Without stable and universally accepted scientific plant names, scientific communication between people is impossible. Beginning in antiquity, and later in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, Latin increasingly came to be used in scholarship, as it facilitated international communication among scientists. Works in various fields of science were written in Latin, and botanical terminology and plant names were developed in it. This tradition has survived to the present day. Latin plant names are essential in scientific and specialized works; only they are considered true terminology, while terms in national languages are merely national variants. Through the efforts of botanical systematists, nomenclatural rules were created and continually refined, forming the basis of nomenclatural codes (Codex nomenclaturae).

The following codes for the nomenclature of living organisms are now used in biology:

1. International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.

¹ Taxon (Greek taxis – arrangement, ordering) is a systematic unit (species, genus, family, class, phylum) (BTŽ 1965: 438).

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2. International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants.²

3. International Code of Zoological Nomenclature.

4. International Code of Nomenclature of Bacteria.

Virus nomenclature is based not on a formal code, but on sets of rules.

These codes have much in common (they are all based on numbered rules and recommendations; to help systematists understand the requirements of the rules and recommendations, the codes provide many specific examples), but they differ in their terminology, nomenclatural procedures, and procedures for adoption. This situation creates certain problems in biology, and therefore the International Union of Biological Sciences seeks to standardize the terms used in different fields and the nomenclatural procedures applied there, and to develop a single unified code of biological nomenclature that all biologists could follow in the future.

The Martynas Mažvydas National Library holds three International Codes of Botanical Nomenclature published in Russian (hereafter ICBN). The oldest was published in 1959 (this code was adopted at the VIII International Botanical Congress in Paris in 1954). The 1974 edition was prepared on the basis of materials from the XI Botanical Congress, held in Seattle in 1969; the third code was printed in 1980 (adopted at the XII International Botanical Congress, held in Leningrad (now St Petersburg) in 1975). The national library does not hold earlier or more recent editions of the codes. (These three codes are also held by the Library of the Academy of Sciences.) The Flora and Geobotany Laboratory of the Botanical Institute has the most recent ICBN currently available in Lithuania, published in English in 1994 in Königstein (Germany) (International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (Tokyo Code)). This code was adopted and approved at the XV Botanical Congress in Yokohama and is known as the Tokyo Code³.

² The International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants published in Russian in 1969 was discussed in detail by J. Klimavičius (who linguistically analyzed the motivation for cultivar names, the morphology of names, transliteration and translation, and the use of quotation marks and capital letters) (see Kalbos kultūra 37, 26–33).

³ The Botanical Institute also provides access to the latest Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants (International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants (ICNCP or Cultivated Plant Code)). UC, 1995.

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The originator of the TBNK may be considered to be the Swiss botanist A. P. de Candolle, who was the first to create a set of nomenclatural rules (Lois de la Nomenclature Botanique). In his work, he established important principles and rules (e.g., the principle of priority in the publication of names; a taxon may have only one correct name, etc.). This set of nomenclatural rules was approved at the International Botanical Congress in Paris in 1867. Another botanical congress was held in Paris in 1900, officially regarded as the first; thereafter, congresses were held every five or six years. Beginning with A. P. de Candolle’s rules, 15 editions of the Code have now been published. For convenience, the Codes are named after the cities in which the botanical congresses were held. The most recent international botanical congresses took place in Sydney (Australia) in 1981, Berlin (Germany) in 1987, Yokohama (Japan) in 1993, and St. Louis (USA) in 1999. This article discusses in greater detail the so-called Tokyo Code.

With each new edition of the Code, efforts are made to make it as precise and complete as possible. Each Code is revised and supplemented, but the changes are not radical; usually, only individual provisions of articles are clarified (this can be seen, for example, by comparing the 1974 Seattle and 1980 Leningrad Codes, which differ only in amendments to individual articles). More substantial changes were made only at the XV Botanical Congress held in Japan in 1993. To ensure the stability of botanical nomenclature, the congress recommended that established taxon names not be changed; the new term phylum was adopted, and may be used as a synonym for the term divisio (Lith. skyrius). Since January 2000, new taxon names have been registered with the offices of the International Association for Plant Taxonomy, which also maintain databases on newly described plants and changes in taxon names. These offices provide information on taxon lists or descriptions.

The official text of the TBNK is published in English, French, and German; individual countries then translate it into their national languages. No edition of the Code has been translated into Lithuanian, so Lithuanian botanists and terminologists have to use Russian or English editions.

All scientists who use established or coin new scientific plant names must follow the rules of the TBNK. However,

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these rules are undoubtedly based only on the universal and voluntary agreement of scientists and have no legal status, but scientists who do not follow them are usually ignored by the scientific community.

In preparing the TBNK, around 100 botanists from various countries usually work on it. This is a major and fruitful undertaking, since each researcher no longer needs to coin new names individually. The International Association for Plant Taxonomy plays the leading role in publishing the TBNK; its committees work in divisions organized by plant groups. The highest authority, in whose name the TBNK is published, is the International Botanical Congress. Separate nomenclature committees work in sections, where proposals for improving the Code are considered. Decisions made in the sections are submitted for approval at a plenary session of the congress. All nomenclature committees together form the Commission for Botanical Nomenclature of the International Union of Biological Sciences.

How is the TBNK organized?

Each Code begins with a preamble stating that botany requires a precise and simple nomenclatural system on which botanists from all countries can rely. The plant names in the TBNK are presented according to taxa. This is not done to show their characteristics or history. The purpose of the TBNK is to present methods for forming the names of plant taxonomic units based on taxa. Applying appropriate methods and using consistent models avoids erroneous and meaningless names that would cause confusion in the science of plants. When forming names, other criteria (e.g., how pleasing a name sounds, complete grammatical correctness, paying tribute to the person who described a new species, etc.) are considered less important.

The foundation of the botanical nomenclatural system consists of six principles, which form the first part of the TBNK (the principles are presented immediately after the preamble):

1. Botanical nomenclature is independent of zoological and bacteriological nomenclature. The TBNK applies uniformly to all taxa of both living and fossil plants.

2. Taxon names are formed on the basis of nomenclatural types.

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3. The nomenclature of taxa is based on the principle of priority of publication.

4. Each taxon may have only one correct scientific name.

5. Scientific names of taxa must be Latin.

6. The rules of nomenclature take effect upon their adoption.

The second part of the TBNK consists of rules and recommendations. The most important statements of the rules and recommendations are presented in separate numbered articles. The rules are universally binding. Their purpose is to establish strict order in botanical nomenclature when naming groups of taxa. Names that contravene any rule are categorically rejected. It is not obligatory to strictly follow the statements set out in the recommendations sections. They help in creating more precise and clearer names. If a plant name does not comply with the recommendations, it cannot be rejected; however, such a name can no longer serve as a model for forming other names.

The TBNK contains many examples illustrating the rules and recommendations. The rules state that each individual plant must belong to a particular taxon, which differs in rank and circumscription. Taxa with narrower circumscriptions are of lower rank; the broader the circumscription of a taxon, the higher its rank. The TBNK distinguishes seven principal taxonomic ranks (kingdom, division, class, order, family, genus, species) and five secondary ranks (tribe, section, variety and form). Thus, with the exception of fossil plants, every species belongs to a genus, a genus to a family, a family to an order, and so on. The principal unit of systematics is the species; the next larger unit is the genus. A genus may include from one to several dozen species. If necessary, the number of ranks can be increased by adding the prefix sub- (Latin sub-) to the terms mentioned above, e.g.: subclassis (subclassis), subfamilia (subfamilia), subgenus (subgenus), subspecies (subspecies), and so forth.

The code then presents, as separately numbered articles, provisions explaining how plant taxonomic units are formed. The suffixes and endings of many taxon names are standardized, making it possible to determine precisely which taxon a plant name belongs to.

The TBNK rules state that the names of species (Species) are binary constructions, consisting of the genus name and the specific ep—

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epithet, e.g.: Anemone nemorosa (wood anemone), Calendula officinalis (pot marigold). The Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus proposed in the 13th century that plant species be named using two Latin words. The genus name is always written with a capital letter in Latin, while the specific epithet is written in lowercase. If the full species name has already been mentioned once in the text, it may be abbreviated in subsequent references, retaining only the first letter of the genus name (if this does not cause ambiguity), e.g.: A. nemorosa, C. officinalis. Specific epithets may be derived from a variety of sources and denote some morphological or anatomical feature of the plant (e.g., Plantago lanceolata – ribwort plantain), its color (e.g., Viola tricolor – wild pansy), size (e.g., Arctium minus – lesser burdock), smell (e.g., Anthoxathum odoratum – sweet vernal grass), taste (e.g., Ranunculus acris – meadow buttercup), medicinal or ecological properties (e.g., Betonica officinalis – betony), the time of growth or flowering (e.g., Primula veris – cowslip), and so on.

Genus (Genus) names are expressed in Latin in the singular nominative case, e.g.: Rosa (rose), Stellaria (chickweed). Genus names are chosen according to various criteria: based on distinguishing characteristics of the plant (e.g.: Fumaria – fumitory; Latin fumus – smoke: the plant’s sap irritates the eyes like smoke), on resemblance to other objects (e.g.: Gladiolus – gladiolus; Latin gladius – sword; the leaves resemble a sword), on mythological or Classical sources (e.g.: Mentha – mint; in Greek mythology, the nymph Minthe was transformed into a mint plant), on the surnames of scientists (e.g.: Dahlia – dahlia; Andreas Dahl was a Swedish professor of botany), and so forth. The TBNK allows names to be freely coined from words drawn from a wide variety of sources, requiring only that they take Latin forms.

Family (Familia) names have the Latin ending -aceae, e.g.: Rosaceae (rose family).

Order (Ordo) names have the Latin ending -ales, e.g.: Polygonales (knotweed order).

For a taxon name to be precise, the author's surname and the bibliographic reference in which that name was first publicly published are given alongside it. The citation of the author and bibliography is not part of the scientific name of the taxon, but it gives the name nomenclatural precision. The author of a name is considered to be

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the person who first publicly published the scientific name of a taxon. The cited author's surname is given immediately after the taxon name, e.g.: Phyllicidia, P. boliviensis, P. sovedijformis (Müller Argoviensis, Flora, 63: 286 (1880)). As the example shows, the date on which the taxon name was published is written in parentheses; sometimes, as in this example, other bibliographic details are also given (the publication title, issue number, and page). An author's surname may be abbreviated, e.g., (L.) – Linnaeus.

Botanists in all countries follow the international botanical nomenclature code. For example, the six-volume work Lietuvos TSR flora. (Flora of the Lithuanian SSR) was completed in 1980. It describes all plants belonging to 129 families that grow in Lithuania. Its terminology was more or less standardized and was considered by the Botanical Dictionary Commission in 1966–1972, under the chairmanship of J. Dagys. In Lietuvos TSR floroje (the Flora of the Lithuanian SSR), plants are classified according to A. Engler's phylogenetic classification system, and the new names are consistent with the most recent literature and TBNK requirements. The plants in this work are classified and described using universally accepted taxonomic ranks: divisions are divided into classes, classes into families, families into genera, genera into subgenera, and the latter into individual species. The smallest systematic units described in Lietuvos TSR floroje (the Flora of the Lithuanian SSR)—for example, subgenera, subspecies, and subfamilies—usually have no Lithuanian equivalents, since such ranks are generally used in specialized scientific literature, where scientists need only the Latin name.

The nomenclature of Lithuanian names has not been codified by an official code; however, as can be seen, it is based on certain TBNK principles and the rules of the Lithuanian language. Compared with the terminology of other scientific fields, Lithuanian botanical terms are formed systematically. There is a tendency to designate units of the same rank using derivatives of the same or similar types, e.g.: -ūnai derivatives denote divisions, -ainiai denote classes, -žiedžiai denote subclasses, -iečiai denote orders, and -iniai denote families; pušūnų (Pinophyta) division, pušainių (Pinatae) class, pušiečių (Pinales) order, pušinių (Pinaceae) family, pušis (Pinus) genus, sibirinė pušis (Pinus sibirica) species. As the examples show, the general structure of Lithuanian species names differs from that of Latin species names. In Latin species names, the genus name is the first element, whereas in Lithuanian names the species epithet comes first. There are only a few exceptions, e.g.:

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field horsetail (Equisetum pratense), dwarf birch (Betula nana), etc.

The origins of Lithuanian genus names are highly varied. Some names are taken from the living language, others are translated from Latin or Greek, and so on. In everyday speech, a genus may have several or even a dozen names (synonyms); for example, lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis) is called “hare’s tear” in Miežiškiai (Panevėžys District), “rabbit’s ear” in Darbėnai (Kretinga District), “goat’s beard” in Klaipėda, “little bells” in Panevėžys, and so on. Conversely, the same name may refer to one plant in one dialect and another in a different dialect. For example, “little hearts” refers to bleeding heart (Dicentra spectabilis) in the Biržai dialect; in Kazitiškis (Ignalina District) this is the name for marsh grass-of-Parnassus (Parnassia palustris), while in Akmenė it refers to pennycress (Thlaspi) and shepherd’s purse (Capsella bursa pastoris). In scientific literature, however, each plant has only one approved name.

The terminology of plant systematics differs from that of other fields of science in the strict uniformity of its taxa. Our botanists note that some plants (especially those introduced into Lithuania recently) still lack Lithuanian names. Their coinage is ongoing, but it can confidently be stated that Lithuanian botanical terminology is coherent, systematic, and meets the requirements of the TBNK.

LITERATŪRA

BTŽ – Botanikos terminų žodynas. Red. J. Dagys. Vilnius, 1965, 438.

Gaivenis K. 1958: Lietuvos augalų ir genčių pavadinimai. – Lietuvių kalbotyros klausimai: Mokslo kalbos kultūros ir terminologijos problemos 24, 165–178.

International Code of Botanical nomenclature (Tokyo Code), Königstein, 1994.

Klimavičius J. 1975: Lingvistinis požiūris į veislių nomenklatūrą. – Kalbos kultūra 37, 26–33.

Kutorga E. Botanikos ir mikologijos nomenklatūra, Vilnius, 1997.

Lietuvos TSR flora, Vilnius, 1959–1980.

Veličkiene A. Antikos mitologijos žinynas, Kaunas, 1995.

Aurelija GENELYTĖ

Aurelija GENELYTĖ

Lietuvių kalbos institutas

Antakalnio g. 6, 2055 Vilnius

Gauta 2001 10 16

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