Arbutus caule erecto, foliis glabris serratis, baccis polyspermis - or the benefits of Binomial Nomenclature

Binomial nomenclature is the naming convention that was introduced by Swedish botanist Carl Linneaus in 1753. This consisted of a genus name (eg. Viola) and a species name (eg. mirabilis), which is what the plant 'Arbutus caule erecto, foliis glabris serratis, baccis polyspermis' became known as after the binomial system was introduced.

This binomial system always used latin terms and was the standard term the world over. Most people know plants by the common name, which varies in different locations. In the UK the Viola mirabilis is known as the 'Wonder Violet'. In this instance countries like The Netherlands use the same common name, but with the Dutch spelling 'wonderviooltje', but the Latin name and spelling stays the same regardless of country.

The binomial system was a success and was followed up in 1905 with the International rules of Botanical Nomenclature adopted by the International Botanical Conference of Vienna 1905. This became the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature, which was changed in 2011 to the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN). Along with these changes the Melbourne Code of 2011 allows electronic-only publications, which is a big change as previously there was a requirement that at least two copies of the name publication had to be depositied in libraries. From January 2012 new plant names can be published as an online PDF as long as it has an ISSN or an ISBN.

An even bigger change is that English can be used as an alternative to Latin for the first time in the history of the International Code for the description of plants. Allowing the description in English may speed up and ease the process of naming plants, which could help protect endangered plants - as plants cannot be protected without a description. While this can only be used for describe for new taxa and all current Latin descriptions remain, it's an important step forward.

This goes to show that the subject of Botany is going through some exciting changes.

For further information see the following:

Short Video - English for plant descriptions

The Linnean Society

ICN - Wikipedia Page