Access Resource - Global Biodiversity Information Facility

10 Terms used in Bionomenclature
Committee reported that it would be advantageous to produce a
comprehensive glossary of biological nomenclature. To that end, in
November 1993 I circulated a first draft aiming to cover the five principle
Codes to several colleagues; the production of that draft was facilitated by
the glossary in Charles Jeffrey's Biological Nomenclature (1989). A second
draft was prepared in March 1994, and critically annotated by nominated
representatives of the different Codes serving on the then embryo
IUBS/IUMS International Committee on Bionomenclature (ICB). Taking
note of the painstakingly prepared inputs received, A Draft Glossary of
Terms used in Bionomenclature was published by IUBS in July 1994; this
had 1175 entries. This opened the draft to comment from the wider
biological community, and I continued to compile additions and corrections
received, as well as to incorporate updates and revisions necessitated by
new editions of the Codes and the scrutiny of other publications. Yet a
further draft was made available to several colleagues for comment on the
occasion of the International Botanical Congress in Vienna in July 2005,
and at a meeting of the ICB in London in June 2009.
Such a compilation can never be exhaustive, and it is being released now as
it has reached a stage where, hopefully, it will be of value to all those
concerned with the naming of whole organisms. However, awareness of the
possible deficiencies of the 1994 draft, led me to place a “health-warning”
on the back cover. The present work must also be used with caution, and
while representatives of the various Codes have assisted in the venture, it
has no formal standing in biological nomenclature.
Users who come across omissions or misinterpretation, or encounter
alternative uses of already included terms, are encouraged to submit details
to me (d.hawksworth@nhm.ac.uk) so that they can be accommodated in
any future edition.
Scope
This compilation covers terms employed in the current editions of the
different internationally mandated and proposed organismal Codes; i.e.
those for botany (including mycology), cultivated plants, prokaryotes
(archaea and bacteria), virology, and zoology, as well as the Draft BioCode
and PhyloCode. Also incorporated are abbreviations, latinizations, and
synonyms, as well as the numerous terms which are either no longer