When you see a strange flower or plant in the wild or in a park, you must be wondering most: What is its name?
For people who have just begun to learn to understand plants, the most troublesome thing is the Chinese name of plants. Because the Chinese title of plants often varies with the times and places, the same plant often has different names (homonyms),
For example, starfruit is also known as five-fold, yang peach, sheep peach; and even different plants may have the same name (the same name foreign body), such as purslane of the purslane family and the watery wood of the mulberry family (also known as the great tree). Therefore, to know plants, you have to figure out the name before you can communicate with people.
Common names and Latin names
It can be said that naming plants and animals is one of the most primitive instincts of human beings, and names are the basis for people to communicate with each other and exchange various plant information. However, because of the different cultures of different ethnic groups, the names of the same plant are often different, and it is often difficult to communicate. Usually, countries around the world have plant names named in their own country's script, which is the common name. The chrysanthemums, roses, peonies, metasequoias, ginkgo biloba, alder, bauhinia and so on, as we know them, are all plant names, but they are not scientific names, but common or local names. For example, red maple has at least 4 common names in the eastern United States.
In England, the white water lily has at least 15 common names, and if you count the german, French and Dutch names, it has more than 240 common names. Sometimes, a common name is used in different regions to refer to completely different plants. So common names usually do not provide information about genus or interspecific relationships, which are isolated from each other. Some plants, especially some rare varieties, do not have common names.
In order to facilitate research and communication, there is an urgent need to adopt a universal language and name a creature with a single unanimous name, so there is also a common name for a plant name in Latin, and the Latin name of the plant is decided by the International Botanical Society to determine the naming convention and then implement it.
At present, Latin names are the standard names for communication in the international botanical community, and other names do not count. The international standard botanical name adopts the double name method and was first coined by the Swedish botanist Linnaeus on May 1, 1753. That is, the scientific name of the plant is uniformly composed of a genus name and a species name (also known as a species plus word), followed by a named person's personal name, which is generally the name of the name person, and is uniformly expressed in Latin.
Take, for example, wheat and rice, which we are most familiar with. The Latin name of wheat (also known as the Latin scientific name) is "Triticum aestivum Linn,", of which the first word is wheat genus, the second word is summer (summer), meaning harvested in summer, and the third word is the initial name of the Swedish botanist Linnaeus. The Latin name for rice is "Oryza sativaLinn,", of which the first word comes from the Greek word meaning rice, the second word means planted, and the third word is the same as wheat, which is an abbreviation for Linnaeus.
The advantage of using the two-name method is that the Latin scientific name of the plant is written out, no matter which country scholars see it knows which plant is referred to, and the family, genus, and species to which the plant belongs are clear at a glance, avoiding the confusion of using common names.
In general, the genus names and species additions of Latin scientific names are meaningful, but there are also some meanings of nouns that are unknown today.
Since we use more common names of plants, the following focus is on the common names of plants.
In terms of flowers and plants, there are more than 300,000 species in the world, each species has a Chinese name, many species are far more than one name, and many species share a name, the situation is quite complicated. But there are mysteries in the middle.
Let's start with dandelions
Where did the name dandelion come from? I was puzzled for many years, and then I found the answer from a folklore. Legend has it that the girl of an ancient family had breast sores, the pain was unbearable, and the feudal parents not only did not sympathize, but thought that she was not chaste, so angry that the girl wanted to find short-sightedness, ran to the river and jumped into the river. It happened that a father and daughter surnamed Pu were fishing and rescued her. Knowing of the girl's condition, Father Pu picked a kind of grass and mashed it so that the girl could apply it to the affected area. After applying the medicine several times, he actually cured the girl's illness. The girl was so happy that she called the nameless grass a dandelion as a token of gratitude to the father and daughter of the Pu family. Since then, the anti-inflammatory effect of dandelions and sores has been passed down. But the truth of the story is unknown.
The book "The Famous Examination of this Herb" has a better understanding of the origin of the name dandelion.
According to the book, dandelions were originally called "dandelion grass", which first appeared in the Tang Dynasty book "New Repair Materia Medica". By the Song Dynasty, the Bencao Tu Jing had the name dandelion. Ming Dynasty Li Jue's "Introduction to Medicine" book: "Pu used this herb to cure carbuncle swelling and was saved, hence the name." "This is in line with the folklore that preceded it.
But the examination of the three words "dandelion" still has mysteries.
Before the "New Cultivation of Materia Medica", the famous doctor Sun Simiao's "Preparation for Emergencies and Thousands of Golden Recipes" had the name of "Gongying", that is, dandelion. The sound "凫" is "floating", referring to wild ducks. "凫公", jude "凫翁", refers to the hairs on the neck of wild ducks. Volume III of the Rush Chapter: "The Grass Chicken Cocks Weng Mao." Yan Shigu's ancient note: "The one who is the one who is in the water, the bird in the water, the water duck that is now called the water duck." Weng, the hair on the head also. Tang Xuanying's "All Sutras and Meanings": "The bird's head is hairy." "When the fruit of the dandelion is ripe, it has a beak at the top of the fruit and a clump of white crown hairs at the top of the beak, which is shaped like a "skull". "English" actually means "flower". Qu Yuan's "Departure from sorrow" has the sentence "Autumn Chrysanthemum's Falling Ying", and "Falling Ying" means falling flowers.
This makes it clear that after the dandelion blooms, the fruit ripens with white hairs, such as "Kai Weng", so it is called dandelion. The word "凫" was consonantly pronounced "蒲", and finally the name "dandelion" was called, which is the common name today.
Turned a big bend, examined a lot, the name of dandelion came out of the water, "the name of this herbal medicine" is indispensable, it can be seen that the source of some plant names must check the archaeological books, there is a way, especially ancient medicine.
Named after morphological habits
The names of many plants are obviously based on morphological habits, such as ginkgo biloba.
According to the "Shaoxing Materia Medica": "Ginkgo biloba, with its color like silver, shaped like a small apricot, is named after it." The so-called "color is like silver" refers to the fact that the outer skin of ginkgo biloba seeds has a layer of white powder, which is as white as silver. Ginkgo biloba, also known as "white fruit", is due to the fact that the outer fleshy seed coat of ginkgo biloba seeds is removed, and the middle seed coat is white. Why is ginkgo biloba also called "white fruit"? It is because ordinary people mistakenly believe that ginkgo seeds are fruits. Ginkgo biloba is also known as duck foot wood because of its leaf resembling duck foot. The Compendium of Materia Medica refers to Ginkgo biloba as the "Gongsun Tree". It has been explained that the husband planted ginkgo trees, but for many years he could not produce seeds, and he could not eat ginkgo seeds until his grandchildren. It can be seen that a kind of ginkgo biloba, many names, are based on its morphological habits.
Another example is honeysuckle, which is a vine of the genus Honeysuckle in the family Honeysuckle. The so-called "honeysuckle" refers to the fact that this plant does not wither in winter, and even the leaf axils can produce new shoots and leaves. Therefore, it is also called "ninja grass" or "winter vine".
Honeysuckle is also known as "honeysuckle". According to the "Compendium of Materia Medica": "The flowers are white at the beginning of the year, but after one or two days, they are yellow, so they are called 'honeysuckle'." ”
People who do not understand think that honeysuckle can bloom yellow and white flowers, so honeysuckle has the name of "double flower".
Another example is monk fruit, which belongs to the vine of the cucurbitaceae family, and its fruit is slightly longer spherical, covered with white fur, much like the head of the monk, so it is called monk fruit. Monk fruit is a medicine that clears the heat and moisturizes the lungs and treats constipation.
Similarly named plants are Also Luo Han Pine, belonging to the genus Luo Han Pin in the Luo Han Family, its seeds are oval, up to 1.2 cm long, with a fleshy quilt on the outside, white powder, and the shape is also similar to the head of the Luo Han, hence the name.
Named after seasonality
From growth, flowering, fruiting to wilting, the life of a plant is seasonal, and there are many plants named after it, such as summer dry grass.
The plants of summer dry grass grow vigorously in the spring and gradually wither in summer, so it is called summer dry grass.
There is also a summer solstice grass, a common weed in the north, that sprouts in the spring and blooms quickly
Flowers, in May and June, gradually wither, at this time is the summer solstice season, so the name of the summer solstice grass.
The spring flower is a shrub of the wood tree family, which blooms in early spring, and people think that it is the earliest flowering plant in spring, so it is called the spring flower.
There is a bitter vegetable in the northern mountains, which is a wild herb belonging to the Asteraceae family. Because this plant does not flower until autumn, it is named "autumn bitter vegetable".
It is a Chinese medicinal herb belonging to the Asteraceae family. The reason why it is named "winter" means that this flower is not afraid of the cold and is born in winter.
The name of a person in a plant name
Some plant names come from ancient personal names.
He Shou Wu is a vine of the family Tateshina, which is used in medicine and has the effect of wushu hair. Its name is derived from folklore. According to the "Yezi Materia Medica", "Its medicinal herbs are nameless, because He Shou Wu saw the vines at night, that is, he had the merit of eating, because he was famous for picking people." That is to say, there was a man named He Shouwu who found that the vines of this plant were intertwined at night, and he named it after him.
There is also a legend that in ancient times, there was a white-haired old man surnamed He, whose white hair turned black because he ate this plant, and lived a long life of 100 years, so he called this plant "He Shou Wu".
Another example is Xu Changqing, which belongs to the genus Goose velvet vine of the family Luo Mushroom, and its roots are medicinal. Xu Changqing was originally a personal name, according to Li Shizhen: "Xu Changqing, also personal name, often uses this medicine to cure evil diseases, and people take their names." "Its medicinal functions are to dispel wind and dampness, relieve pain and itch, and treat bruises."
Another example is Liu Jinu, an herbaceous plant of the family Xuan ginseng. Liu Jinu was originally a personal name. In ancient legend, when Liu Jinu led the army, he once saw a large snake on the mountain, and Liu shot the snake with an arrow. The next day, Liu Jinu heard the sound of pounding in the forest, and it turned out that two children were pounding a kind of grass in the stone mortar with a pestle. The child told Liu Jinu that their king had been wounded by an arrow yesterday, which was the medicine for healing the wound. Liu Jinu loudly scared away the child, retrieved the medicine, and treated people's injuries, and sure enough, it had the effect of activating blood and dissolving stasis. Later, people called this grass "Liu Jinu".
Eucommia tree is a specialty of China, is also a medicinal plant, its bark into medicine, can treat high blood pressure. Eucommia gum is an industrial raw material. Why is it called Eucommia? According to Li Shizhen, "In the past, Du Zhong obeyed this way and obtained the Tao, because of his name. Li Shizhen's explanation is more far-fetched, it is likely that Eucommia took this medicine to cure the disease, so people named this tree after Eucommia.
Plants named after animals
Some plants are named after animals, mostly in pictograms, such as dogtail grass, which belongs to the genus Dogtail grass, whose flower spikes have many hairs and are shaped like dog tails. Wolftail grass is thicker and longer than dogtail grass. Tigertail grass, the inflorescence is much wider, cattail is similar ... All of the above species are grasses.
In addition, there are sage, sheep grass, hyena, verbena, monkey chestnut, goldfish algae, foxtail algae, cornflower grass, rhododendron, leopard flower, and so on.
Another example is the Latin name rjcinus of castor, which means lice parasitic on sheep and dogs. Because the seed form of castor is very similar to that of lice. The Latin name of the cockscomb flower is Cefasia cristata, of which Cetosia is derived from the Greek Khoros, meaning fire, referring to the cockscomb flower as red as fire.
The name of the famous flower probes the source
Among the top ten famous flowers in China, the name of peony is very interesting. According to the "Compendium of Materia Medica", "Peony is based on the Sedan, although it bears fruit and grows seedlings on the roots, so it is called peony." "The experience of the ancients was that peonies were planted without seeds, but were propagated directly from the seedlings that grew from their roots. In this way, the plant becomes a horse without oysters, so it is called "oyster".
The reason why plum blossoms got their name "plum", according to Li Shizhen' saying: "Plums, media also." Mediated. "Plums were used as condiments in ancient times, hence the name plum blossoms.
Lotus flowers are also known as lotus flowers. "Lotus", how to interpret the word? According to the "Explanation of Words": "Lotus, hibiscus leaf." Duan Yu cut note: "The big leaf is terrifying, so it is called a lotus." Li Shizhen explained that the lotus stem "is the negative leaf also, the meaning of the load." So, what is the interpretation of the word "lotus"? According to Xu Hao's note in the "Commentary on the Interpretation of Texts": "The words of the lotus are connected, and its rooms are connected to the genus like a bee." "This explanation makes a lot of sense.
The name daffodil is related to ancient Greek mythology. In ancient Greek mythology, there was a young man named Narcissus, who was so handsome that many fairies liked him, but he rejected him. The goddess of vengeance learned of this and decided to punish him. Once, Nathysos saw his own shadow in the water, mistakenly thought it was a beautiful girl, fell in love with her, and finally died in the water, transforming into a daffodil. The Latin name of the daffodil is "Nathysos".
Another example is the Latin name Nymphaea of the genus Water Lily, which is named after the goddess of forests and rivers.
Named after the environment and place names
The names of many plants reflect the ecological environment in which they live, while the names of others reflect the regions in which they are distributed. The former such as alpine aster, forest forget-me-not,water bitter, water flounder, dry wheat bottle grass, northern sand ginseng, Sichuan moss grass, rock defeat sauce, salt ground alkali pon, tile pine... The latter include Shandong anemone, Ningxia goji berry, Shanxi Xuan ginseng, Sichuan qianjin vine, twist head, Kunming rhodiola rosea, rhodiola rosea, Huangshan oak, Hebei oak and so on.
Another example is the Latin name Otrus of orange, which comes from cifron, the name of a town in Palestine.
Dendrobium, a large genus of orchids, has the Latin name Dendrobium, of which dendron means tree, bios means life, and together it means dendrobium is an air plant that grows on trees.
The willow genus Safix is derived from the ancient Sanskrit word meaning water, indicating the water-loving characteristics of this plant.
Named after a misunderstanding
Some plants got their names because people at that time misstated the characteristics of these plants, and only saw the surface phenomena without in-depth study, and decided on the names. The most famous of these plants is the fig.
Figs belong to the genus Ficus spp., native to India, and are small trees with inflorescences in the shape of an inverted cone that have been mistaken for fruit and that the plant is not considered to flower. Hence the name Fig.
I can't tell the name of the source
There are also some plant names that cannot be verified, such as the osmanthus flower in the top ten flowers, also known as the wood tree, which blooms in autumn, and the flowers are small and many, very fragrant. For example, the name of the rhododendron is difficult to say clearly, is it because the flowering is at the time when the dubab calls?
It should be noted that the Chinese way of calling plants today almost always uses the past titles. If there is a new plant and the Chinese common name of the plant cannot be found, it is often translated literally from the English name, or translated into Chinese in the meaning of the scientific name.