Euphorbia means
antiquorum means antique.....dont know why!
Regards
Pankaj
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"TAXONOMISTS GETTING EXTINCT AND SPECIES DATA DEFICIENT !!"
Pankaj Kumar Ph.D. (Orchidaceae)
Research Associate
Greater Kailash Sacred Landscape Project
Department of Habitat Ecology
Wildlife Institute of India
Post Box # 18
Dehradun - 248001, India
Euphorbia antiquorum L. Sp. Pl. 1: 450. 1753
Type: Lectotype - Herb. Clifford: 196, Euphorbia 1 (BM)
Euphorbia named for Euphorbus, Greek physician to Juba II, King of Mauretania
antiquorum means antique.....dont know why!
Regards
Pankaj
Regards,
Mani.
> *Tanay Bose*
Nothing special about being displayed in a trophy. People have their
own way of decorating their herbarium sheets. George Clifford had his
own ways and this is one of them. Same goes to the label. Ideally the
paper is supposed to be of A3 size with a label on lower right hand
side. But there is no such written rule in ICBN or anywhere. This is
just to make it acceptable through out the world for carrying,
distribution and exchange for scientific purpose. During old periods,
herbariums used to exchange their sheets in return for other sheets
from the next herbaria. Clifford's specimens were used almost 15 years
later by Linnaeus to describe many of his species. Infact there was a
time when Linnaeus used to work for Clifford on the catalogue of the
plants in his garden and herbarium and came out with Hortus
Cliffortianus in 1738, much before his own Species Plantarum (1753),
though Species Plantarum is considered as first Taxonomic treatise
with binomial nomenclature, which it is not!!
One such great example is of N. Wallich. He collected hell lot of
samples and made 20 copies of each taxa from Indian subcontinent.
Though he never could describe most of them himself. 1000s of new
species emerged from his specimens later. Because he did one very nice
effort by distributing his specimens to 8 different herbaria of the
world to facilitate others to work upon. He could do this, because he
maintained the same format for all sheets.
Even for labelling the specimens, ideally calligraphic ink pen is
supposed to be used and there used to be specialised calligraphers
appointed for this purpose during those periods. Hooker and Wallich
were supposed to be very good calligraphers themselves. Those were the
good old taxonomic days.
You know in Germany, the Berlin herbarium was destroyed during the
world war and many of their sheets were lost, including lots of type
sheets. So these high profile herbarium have now another set preserved
in war proof rooms so that, incase if there is again a bomb on their
herbarium, then they will have sheets to revive their herbarium. They
have specialized, isolated underground, war proof zones with
restricted entry.
Just to make it interesting, I am attaching a sketch of Rauvolfia
tetraphylla L. Sp. Pl. 1: 208. 1753. Though the original citation
belong to Hort. Cliff. but Species Plantarum is considered as its
original description. Interestingly the sketch is from Hortus
Cliffortianus written in 1737-38.
Regards
Pankaj
HOPE THIS IS NOT BORING....
Theophastrus did gave classification of some plants but he never used
Binomial Nomenclature so his names are botanically invalid, and same
goes to the famous indian treatise of Hortus Malabaricus.
At the same time, Linnaeus never claimed himself that he was the first
one. If you go through his texts in Species Plantarum, he has compiled
all the information on the same plant by previous authors including
some of his own works.
But its Article 7.7 of ICBN Vienna Code, which states that:
"A name validly published by reference to a previously and effectively
published description or diagnosis (Art. 32.1(d)) is to be typified by
an element selected from the context of the validating description or
diagnosis, unless the validating author has definitely designated a
different type (but see Art. 10.2). However, the type of a name of a
taxon assigned to a group with a nomenclatural starting-point later
than 1 May 1753 (see Art. 13.1) is to be determined in accordance with
the indication or descriptive and other matter accompanying its valid
publication (see Art. 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43,
44, 45)."
Even another strange fact is, both volumes of Species Plantarum were
not published on 1st of May 1753 but the second was somewhere in
August. But according to ICBN both has to be considered published on 1
May 1753. All according to the convenience of those Europeans who
loved Linnaeus most probably.
Regards
Pankaj
Pankaj
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