Understanding Botanical Names :

To a layperson, the botanical names sound very intimidating. It is not uncommon to wonder why have such complex names for plants, and why can't we just use common names. The answer is that, common names do not uniquely specify a plant. You can have more than one plant called trumpet vine or yellow bells. The botanical names, on the other hand, uniquely specify every plant.Another important fact is that a botanical name may tell you much more about a plant than a common name. There is a meaning associated with each part of the name. This will be clear in the following. The botanical names consist of two parts (or epithets), genus and the specific epithet (species for short):

Botanical name = Genus + species

Genus: A genus refers to a group of plants which share certain structural characteristics. The genus name may come from mythology, literature, people, places, or something the plant resembles.
Species: The species name usually refers to a place where the plant is native, the plant's appearance, or the name of the person credited with discovering it. Individual species are precisely identified by analyzing the flowers and seeds of each plant. The determining criteria might be the number of petals on the flower, or a certain characteristic of the seed.

Example : Calliandra haematocephala

Calliandra - Calli = beautiful Andra = Male flower parts or stamens. This means, plant with beautiful stamens.haematocephala - haema - blood red cephale head; front. This means, one with blood-red head or front.This example shows that just knowing the name gives one lots of information about the flower. This system was developed by Carl Linnaeus, an 18th century botanist. Today, this cataloging is done by the group of botanists who analyze the characters and attributes of plants, and put them into the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.