Cozy Together. Honeybees, Apis mellifera, on Ice Plant or Livingstone Daisy, Dorotheanthus bellidiformis, Hortus Botanicus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
If you listened carefully you may have heard some gnashing of teeth as I was writing this... I don't really like the name for our plant, 'Dorotheanthus'. Martin Heinrich Gustav Schwantes (1881-1960) who coined this word (1927) no doubt much loved his mother Dorothea Schwantes née Meyer (1849-?), but I think his ear was off when he made up 'Dorotheanthus'. Yet there we are: it is our plant's official name.
But we are still allowed, too, to use its synonym: Mesembryanthemum, coined by Johann Jakob Dillenius (1684-1749) in 1719 and adopted by great Carolus Linnaeus. Give it to considerate Dillenius to have sought not to overly confuse his botanical colleagues. Earlier in 1684, Jacob Breyne (1637-1697) had used the word 'Mesembrianthemum', which he derived from the Greek words for noon and for flower. But between 1684 and 1719 more of this kind of plant had been found, some of which did not flower at midday. Hence Dillenius - seeking to leave more or less intact Breyne's designation - changed only a single letter in the latter's name: the 'i' for a 'y'; it now meant - again with Greek derivation - 'a flower with its pistil ('embryo') in the middle'. Now, that's the kind of inventivity I really like.
Our Two Honeybees doubtless from the same nest are far too busy to care about these things. And I got up and helped myself to a spoonful of honey from Brazilian coffee flowers.
Cozy Together. Honeybees, Apis mellifera, on Ice Plant or Livingstone Daisy, Dorotheanthus bellidiformis, Hortus Botanicus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
If you listened carefully you may have heard some gnashing of teeth as I was writing this... I don't really like the name for our plant, 'Dorotheanthus'. Martin Heinrich Gustav Schwantes (1881-1960) who coined this word (1927) no doubt much loved his mother Dorothea Schwantes née Meyer (1849-?), but I think his ear was off when he made up 'Dorotheanthus'. Yet there we are: it is our plant's official name.
But we are still allowed, too, to use its synonym: Mesembryanthemum, coined by Johann Jakob Dillenius (1684-1749) in 1719 and adopted by great Carolus Linnaeus. Give it to considerate Dillenius to have sought not to overly confuse his botanical colleagues. Earlier in 1684, Jacob Breyne (1637-1697) had used the word 'Mesembrianthemum', which he derived from the Greek words for noon and for flower. But between 1684 and 1719 more of this kind of plant had been found, some of which did not flower at midday. Hence Dillenius - seeking to leave more or less intact Breyne's designation - changed only a single letter in the latter's name: the 'i' for a 'y'; it now meant - again with Greek derivation - 'a flower with its pistil ('embryo') in the middle'. Now, that's the kind of inventivity I really like.
Our Two Honeybees doubtless from the same nest are far too busy to care about these things. And I got up and helped myself to a spoonful of honey from Brazilian coffee flowers.