{"id":460,"date":"2020-11-03T19:48:56","date_gmt":"2020-11-03T19:48:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/?p=460"},"modified":"2022-10-25T18:01:36","modified_gmt":"2022-10-25T18:01:36","slug":"whats-in-a-name-pt-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/2020\/11\/03\/whats-in-a-name-pt-2\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s in a Name, Pt 2."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Last time <\/a>we discussed the process of naming biological organisms following Carl Linnaeus’s binomial nomenclatural system, i.e. each named critter has two parts to its name, a genus and a specific epithet. These names, by international agreement use Latin or Greek endings, so as an example of an odd species name, I mentioned “Cartwrightia cartwrighti<\/em> Cartwright, 1967,” where:
1) the genus, Cartwrightia<\/em> was created in 1958 to honor Oscar Cartwright who, in 1967,
2) named a new species in in that genus, cartwrighti<\/em>, to honor his brother, Raymond, and, since the Oscar named the species,
3) his name as author follows the species name, so we get yet another “Cartwright.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there are odder names! And, before I go any further, if you have any interest in this, please see the writings of Stephen B. Heard: His book, Charles Darwin’s Barnacle and David Bowie’s Spider<\/a> is a delight. I learned of it from his highly entertaining and informative blog, Scientist Sees Squirrel<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, I confess that for most of my entomological career, I was a die-hard, stick-in-the-mud traditionalist who believed and espoused the notion that scientific names should be descriptive, e.g. Homo sapiens<\/em> Linnaeus 1758. or Latrodectus mactans<\/em> (Fabricius, 1775). The etymology of the former was discussed in my previous posting; the latter is interesting because the Greek Latrodectus<\/em> can mean “secretly biting” and the Latin mactans<\/em> can mean “slaughtering or killing.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh, yeah–lest I forget–L. mactans<\/em> is the spider commonly called a black widow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Adult female Latrodectus mactans<\/em> feeding on an American cockroach, Periplaneta americana<\/em> Linnaeus, 1758<\/center><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I grudgingly accepted naming species for scientists, such as Messrs. Cartwright, above, and even places; e.g. the defunct cockroach pictured above is in the genus Periplaneta<\/em>, the Greek roots of which can mean “all around wanderer.” The species is P. americana<\/em>: not too hard to figure that one out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/a>

But I drew the line at non-scientists or even–perish the thought–fictional characters. Until, that is, my favorite cartoonist of all time was honored by having a chewing louse*👇<\/a>, Strigiphilus**👇<\/a> garylarsoni<\/em> Clayton, 1990 so-named in recognition of Larson’s “…enormous contribution…made to biology through [his] cartoons.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cool, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then I saw this spider:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Article\"\/
Eriovixia gryffindori<\/em> Ahmed et al., 2016
(Its head is downhill, to the left)<\/center><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This, friends, is Eriovixia gryffindori<\/em> Ahmed, Khalap & Sumukha, 2016. It’s colloquially called the “Sorting Hat spider.” Definitely fictitious, right? But what a perfect name! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

BTW, it could be a bit difficult to see this spider on dry leaves:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

So not only have I come to accept fanciful names, I now embrace them. They stir my curiosity, and have led to many delightful hours of researching names and animals to which I would otherwise have paid no attention!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/a>\n

In closing, I give you the longest proposed scientific name, a bacterium eponymously named for the famed town***👇<\/a> in Wales, Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch: Myxococcus llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogochensis<\/em> Chambers et al., 2020 (the “ensis” on the end indicating that it is named for that town).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next time–the dread “common name”!
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n<\/a>*👆<\/a> Chewing lice are commonly called “bird lice,” and this species is only found on owls.
\n<\/a>**👆<\/a><\/a> Strigiphilus can be loosely translated as “bristle-lover.”
\n<\/a>***👆<\/a>Google Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (without the “ensis”).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last time we discussed the process of naming biological organisms following Carl Linnaeus’s binomial nomenclatural system, i.e. each named critter has two parts to its name, a genus and a specific epithet. These names, by international agreement use Latin or … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=460"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1117,"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460\/revisions\/1117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zeppmusic.com\/Arthroblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}