What's In a Name: Flora and Fauna

By Spring Brookring

Ahoy, faithful (or not so faithful) readers of Yn Nor! Hi, Mom! Hi, Dad! Look, I'm on the Internet! *waves* Ahem. This month's What's In a Name is sponsored by Bob's Tree Shop and is brought to you by the number 8 and the letters S-P-R-I-N-G.

This month's topic is names derived from flora and fauna. You would know this if you had read the title. To clear things up, for those of you who don't already know, flora means plants and fauna means animals. If you didn't know what those words meant, and I didn't tell you, this article probably would have made even less sense than normal. Hard to imagine, isn't it?

There is a huge abundance of various plant and animal names out there. This article, if you pay attention, will offer you some common sense guidelines for choosing them (mostly plants, because they're easier and I'm lazy). For instance, take Cornflower. This is a fine name, in the real world, in Redwall, or engraved on a dinner plate. However, a word synonymous with cornflower, Centaurea Cyanus, is not a good name. Centaurea Cyanus is the Latin classification name for daisy, and my spellchecker doesn't like it. Neither will a reader if you choose to name your character Centaurea Cyanus. The character probably won't be thrilled either. If you do pick Centaurea Cyanus as a character's moniker, you should check to make sure that you have triple locks on your front door and a fence around your house, because some semi-sane person will undoubtedly start a protest. Said protester(s) may throw rocks or small rubber chickens. Be warned.

So now we know that Latin names are a no-no. Well, not entirely. How about the word celosia? Celosia is the Latin name for the plant cockscomb. In this situation, the Latin name is great, but I would highly suggest not naming any characters or washing machines Cockscomb. For one thing, it's a pretty ugly plant, judging by the picture in my gardening book (or maybe the artist was just bad at drawing). For another, I think it's referring to a red thing on a rooster's head. If you have the extreme misfortune to be named Cockscomb yourself, well, that stinks. Consider getting your name changed to Celosia.

Plant names are excellent when used sensibly. Remember Pasque Valerian, from The Long Patrol? A pasque flower is "an early-blooming, crocus-like wildflower of North America with purplish flowers and hairy leaves," according to my handy-dandy wildflower book. I didn't know that until…hmm…sometime fairly recently, I'm sure. And valerian is a type of herb. Here is a case of nice, easily pronounceable plant names. They don't even trip up my spellchecker. And there are an infinite number of them in the Redwall books. There're some pretty overworked ones, like the obvious Rose and Willow (Editor’s Note: Hey! ‘Scuse me? Did you just say Willow is overused? How dare you! j/k). But there are others, like, um, well, others. Go look them up in the Redwall books yourself and leave me to my laziness.

Now, I suppose I should mention fauna names, since I put it in the title. These ones you have to be a leetle more careful with. Like, don't name a character Mouse. Even if it is a mouse. This also goes for Beetle, Moose, Pigeon, Dog, Antelope, Anaconda, Vulture, Turtle, Puffer fish, Mosquito, and many, many, many, many others that would take so much time to list that I would miss watching the Simpsons. So you can just use your imagination.

What kind of animal names are okay? Give me twenty minutes and a faster computer and I could probably find some. Lacking the latter, I'll have to do it the old-fashioned way. *grumbles* Fortunately, my parents are wildlife nuts, so I'm sure we have books around here somewhere…*bookcase falls over* Ouch. Got them. So, riffling through books like "Moose of Yellowstone" and "Mexican Reptiles" and "A Guide to Wildlife of Madagascar," I don't really see much that could be used in the way of names. I also wonder why my parents have these books when we've never been to Madagascar and very likely never will be. Wonders never cease, huh? Returning to the topic that may or may not be at hand, it makes sense that fauna names are pretty rare. Who wants a character named American Bison, anyway? There are a few exceptions, like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, but I highly doubt he was named purposely after a wolf, as his name is Austrian. (Correct me if I'm wrong—I'm not a music buff.)

Something that might work, however, is a bird book. Our copy (covered with post-it notes) is extremely battered and out of date, but helpful at last. Most bird names you want to pass by. For instance, Purple Gallinule is not generally deemed a popular name. Ask anyone off the street if they would prefer the name Purple Gallinule to their own name and, unless their name is Cockscomb, they will say no with vehemence and start backing away slowly, trying to find a large stick or heavy blunt object.

On the other hand, a bird like the vesper sparrow could make a perfectly good name. I wouldn't recommend using "sparrow", but Vesper seems like a good name to me. Don't trust me, though, ask your friendly neighborhood cardboard Name Expert, who will be installed outside your door next Tuesday. And he only costs fifty-two dollars a week, plus maintenance. A bargain.

So, then, kiddies, perhaps this article has been informative, or, more likely, entirely pointless, but if you think it really wasn't worth your while, consider how many people I just stopped from naming a character Cockscomb or worse. You could also wonder if they make numbers that small. Now, if you really want to get into flora and fauna names, I'd suggest buying or borrowing a small to largish (depending on your budget) plant book. Trees, flowers, all sorts of stuff is useful. If you really want to try fauna names, I can only suggest NOT buying a book on the insect life of Ghana, as this will not be helpful in finding names and you will probably never visit Ghana, and so have a chance to put the book to another use. Nothing like finding out the Latin name of the bug that bit you, right?

Comments? Praise? Corrections? Hate mail? Large projectiles? You know where to find me. Well, maybe you don't. But I'm not gonna tell you. And I'm moving. I have quite enough projectiles on the front lawn. And that's the end to this installation of ramble-ocity. Adios. Shoo. Take good care of your friendly neighborhood cardboard Name Expert.