Hidden Origins of English Plant Names

The names of plants, or phytonyms (from Ancient Greek phytón, ‘plant’, and ónoma, ‘name’, ‘noun’), are a very significant part of the lexicon of a language. They represent not only a relevant ‘specialized vocabulary’, but, when investigated through the analysis of the linguistic procedures implemented by speakers to generate them, tell us a lot about the mindset and culture of a population. The etymological reconstructions of phytonyms often hold surprises and challenges for the Linguists who study them and, once completed, enable them to understand the perspectives of a group of individuals and to document their perception of the world.

The English language has a very rich botanical lexicon, and English plant names often tell us fascinating stories. Their origins are etymologically captivating or conceptually startling. Let’s briefly comment on three of them, which are linguistically unique. 

Carnation

The name of the “carnation” (Dianthus caryophyllus), a perennial flowering plant from Southern Europe, represents an unsolved etymological puzzle of the English lexicon. Attested since the first half of the 16 th century, its origins are quite obscure. Some interpretations postulate that the word can be a sort of misspelling of “coronation”, from the use in the ancient world to intertwine crowns and garlands with carnations during ceremonies and rituals or because the petals of the flower form a shape which reminds that of a crown. This reconstruction sounds quite arbitrary and is based on relatively far-fetched analogical reasonings. An alternative name of the “carnation” is “clove pink”, and people who believe that the original or prevailing color of the flower was ‘pink’ (specifically ‘bright pinkish-purple’) postulate that the word is connected with Middle French carnation (equal to Italian carnagione, from Vernacular Latin carnātio, through its accusative singular carnātionem), indicating, since the 15 th century, ‘the color of the skin and flesh of an individual’, namely their ‘complexion’. A Christian interpretation goes even beyond this and connects the phytonym directly with the Latin word incarnātĭo, ‘incarnation’, indicating God becoming human (‘in flesh’) as Jesus. These explanations work, in a way, if we consider them exclusively linked to the ‘pinkness’ of the “carnation” – but many other colors, like white, yellow, and red, exist for the flower (although some of them were eventually generated by selective breeding). In the time of the possible naming process, carnations were valued for their beauty and sweet scent and extensively cultivated in Normandy. The connection of the English name with (Middle) French, therefore, can be somehow supported by elements of material culture. Despite these hypotheses can provide us with some clues on the origins of the word “carnation”, its etymology cannot be confirmed and remains an enigma of the English vocabulary.

Pink Carnation, watercolour (1620s or 1630s) by Balthasar van der Ast (1593/94-1657), Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL, US (Public Domain)

Oleander

“Oleander” is the name of an evergreen flowering shrub (Nerium oleander), also known as “rosebay”, which is as beautiful as it is poisonous. The origins of the denomination of this potentially deadly plant are obscure and their possible explanations circularly revolve around other phytonyms. While “oleander” is attested in English from the end of the first half of the 16 ^th century, the name appears already in Vernacular Latin in the late 14 th century as oleaster, a variant of Medieval Latin oleander, which is another phytonym of uncertain etymology. The element olea- can be connected with Latin ŏlĕa, ‘olive’, ‘olive tree’ – because of a typological resemblance (especially inherent in the leaves) –, which would have been merged with a Late Latin form lorandrum (or arodandrum), possibly derived from Latin rhŏdŏdéndrŏn (from the Ancient Greek name of the majestic woody plant, rhodódendron, literally “rose tree”, from rhódon, ‘rose’, and déndron, ‘tree’ – despite its gorgeous flowers are, naturally, not roses). Lorandrum would have been influenced, in its morphology, by Latin laurĕa, the name of the “laurel” (“bay laurel”, “bay tree”), because of the shape of the leaves of the two plants, which are quite similar. The ideal connections, at the cognitive level, with the rhododendron and the laurel are confirmed by the name of the oleander in French, laurier rose (literally: “laurel rose”). The etymology of “oleander” is an uphill path for the Linguists who try to reconstruct it. The phytonym looks connected with the names of other plants in a sort of ‘onomastic circle’ which underlines the complexity and intricacies of the intellective processes involved in the seemingly simple act of naming.

Oleander Flowers, watercolour (1870s or 1890s) by Johann Heinrich Müller (1825-1894). (Public Domain)

Rubens Peale with a Geranium, oil on canvas (1801) by Rembrandt Peale (1778-1860), National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, US. (Public Domain)

Geranium / Cranesbill

“Geranium” is the name of the genus of hundreds of flowering plants commonly known as “geraniums” and “cranesbills.” The term is attested from the first half of the 16 th century. Despite the plant is well-known for its brightly white, pink, red, and purple flowers, its name doesn’t derive from that feature. “Geranium” comes, indeed, from Botanical Latin geranium, adapted from the Ancient Greek phytonym geránion, a diminutive ( -ion is the diminutive suffix) of géranos, ‘crane’ (cognate, among others, of Old English cran and Latin grūs). The name is in fact ‘analogical’ and derives from the similarity between the shape of the seed pods of a geranium and the head and bill of a crane. The part of the pistil where the ovules reside, called “ovary,” figuratively resembles the ‘head’, while the elongated stigma represents the ‘beak’ of the bird. It is no coincidence, therefore, that a native popular name of the plant, in English, is crane’s-bill or cranesbill. While the etymology of “geranium” is not obscure in itself, its complex cognitive aspects and its naming process based on figurative analogy make the related reconstruction and explanation a very interesting example of the sometimes-uncommon strategies implemented by the human beings to give names to the ‘items’ of their world.

Geranium Seed Capsule. A geranium’s seed pod has been compared to the head and bill of a crane. (BlueRidgeKitties/CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Final Thoughts

Words open a window for us into a universe of knowledge and discoveries. Always. They have complex origins. Always. What we do when we use daily, while speaking, the names of the ‘objects’ of our world is an act as natural as breathing and as ancient as the dawn of language. Etymology, the discipline dealing with the reconstruction of the roots of our words, allows us to unveil the naming process as developed and produced by our ancestors, its remote stages dating back to Prehistory and to the first ‘naming subjects’ (the native speakers of the original proto languages at the origins of most of the languages spoken today) of our civilizations. Among the many ‘lexical items’ which are the substance of our languages, phytonyms allow us to understand the perspectives of those ancestors on some essential and ubiquitous elements of the world which surrounded them in their everyday life – trees, plants, and flowers, indeed – and their perception of them. When we study them, trying to reconstruct their etymologies, we get closer and closer to giving back voice to speakers whose words were not historically recorded, because they were invented and produced in the absence of writing systems, when the technological innovation of writing was not introduced yet. They survive, nonetheless, into the words we use today, transformed, but not irremediably altered over millennia. The analytical reconstruction of the prehistoric origins of specialized lexicons, like the vocabularies of flora and fauna, therefore, allows us to travel in time towards astonishingly ancient ages in the absence of written records.

In this context, the obscurity of the etymology of some plant names adds additional challenges to the operation of their recovery and, at the same time, opens new paths, for Historical Linguists, towards the refinement and enhancement of interpretative tools and hermeneutic directions – ultimately, towards the opening of new linguistic frontiers. It is a journey that seems like it will never end, but a quest that is always worth pursuing.

Top image: The etymology of English Plant Names is a journey through Time and nature. Right: Rubens Peale with a Geranium. Left: Pink Carnation. Source: Public Domain, Public Domain

By Francesco Perono Cacciafoco