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On Pronunciation

 

Accents of any sort are not part of the scientific name. They are added in this Guide merely for the convenience of those of us who are not sure where those fancy neo-Latin words carry their stress. The sources are some of the older German handbooks, notably those of Ernst Hofmann and of Martin Hering, whose authors still paid attention to such trifles. While these and other sources do not always agree and leave quite a few blanks, what they give may still help to avoid some of the worst pronunciation blunders, like following the Roman hunch and saying Catocála adultéra or Anthocháris cardamínes instead of Catócala adúltera and Anthócharis cardámines.

Some of us will be writing in a language that sometimes makes it necessary to decide whether a species be 'he', 'she' or 'it'. In German, for instance, it will be necessary to decide whether it is 'der', 'die' or 'das' Lycaeides. For the correct formation of the scientific name, too, the gender of the genus should be known, as grammatically the species' name is to be treated as an epithet attached to the generic name, either as an adjective as in Nymphalis californica, 'the Californian Nymphalis' (which is the American edition of the European Nettlefly) or Trochilium uralense, 'the Uralian Trochilium' – or else as the genitive either of a proper name (Vaga blackburni, 'Blackburn's Vaga') or of the animal's pet plant (Pieris napi, 'the Pieris of rape,' Brassica napus in Latin). The Code rules that if the specific name is an adjective, it should have the grammatical gender of the genus. Often that will be obvious. Names in -us are masculine (Satyrus, Smerinthus), those in -a feminine (Vanessa, Nabokovia), those in -um neuter (Graphium, Macroglossum). It may be added that those in -es are masculine (Lycaeides, Everes) and those in -is and -as feminine (Pieris, Colias). This recommendation is occasionally neglected, producing ungrammatical names like Colias croceus, Agrodiaetus amanda or Brephidium exilis.

For more on this, any Latin grammar will be helpful. The Latin ae, still written æ in some of the older books, is not a diphthong but pronounced like the a in 'man' or the German Umlaut-a. According to the Code, it should always be spelled ae.

 

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