Original URL: http://www.inform.umd.edu/PBIO/fam/revfam.html
Up-to-date information resulting from the ongoing review of vascular plant nomenclature is available through the Index Nominum supragenericorum Plantarum Vascularium database sponsored by the International Association for Plant Taxonomy (IAPT) and the Norton-Brown Herbarium (MARY) at the University of Maryland with the cooperation of the National Agricultural Library (NAL).
What is presented here are a full listing of all validly published (and thus both legitimate and illegimate) family names and a List of Families that I recognized. The latter basically is a raw list of accepted family names. An additional set of listings of accepted family name and synonymy, with authorship and dates of publication as I outline the families is also provided. This last listings is given in four files because of their size in the hopes of facilitating rapid access:
Accepted families A-C
Accepted families D-L
Accepted families M-R
Accepted families S-Z
To aid those interested only in available (e.g., legitimate) higher ranks, partial listings (only up to approximtely 1900 for suborder, subfamilies, tribes and subtribes) of suprageneric names are available. These are arranged by genus or by family or by rank. An attempt to summarize such name at and above the rank of subclass in current use is available. Corrections and additions would be appreciated.
A flowering plant family name concordances is available. Prepared for an agency within the U.S. Department of Agriculture, this database updates the concordance of Cronquist, Dahlgren, Takhtajan and Thorne names published in Flora North America. Individual fully-annotated treatments are available for Cronquist, Dahlgren, Reveal, Takhtajan, and Thorne. A full listing of Cronquist family names with links to their synonymy created for use by Flowering Plant Gateway is also available.
The concept of "Names in Current Use" was narrowly defeated in 1993, but will certainly be introduced again for consideration in 1999. Since the listing prepared by the late Ruurd D. Hoogland and myself was published in 1993 (see W. Greuter, edit. 1993. Family names in current use for vascular plants, bryophytes, and fungi. Regnum Veg. 126), a small number of names have been newly adopted or newly proposed and thus potentially qualify as NCUs. I propose to maintain an up-to-date version of the NCU list.
In 1993, Hoogland and I presented a list of family names validly published prior to the point indicated in App. IIB of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature after the NCU provisions failed to gain formal approval. Prior additions of conserved names (sensu "protection" as would be formalized by NCU) to the Code were not subject to Art. 52.3 which, prior to the Sydney Code rendered numerous family names superfluous. As a result, many earlier places of publication were now correct. Likewise, the discovery of numerous works previously unknown or not consulted in the past, allowed us to find many new, and earlier, valid places of publication for conserved names.
With the failure at the Tokyo Congress of our proposal to establish Jussieu's 1789 work, Genera Plantarum, as the starting point for family nomenclature, and to avoid changes in authorships and/or places of publication for names on App. IIB, a footnote was added to Art. 14.2, Note 1 which as "a temporary exception" maintains the current entries in the appendix. A list of early valid places of publication for conserved names is made available here.
Author abbreviations follow Brummitt & Powell (1992), '"Authors of Plant Names'" published by the Royal Botanic Garden at Kew. Journal abbreviations are those given in B-P-H (including the recent Supplement) while those for books are taken from TL-II. Abbreviation of recent book titles follow the suggested word abbreviations listed in B-P-H.
These files may be printed out at any time. The information is still dynamic and subject to additions and corrections as my investigations on suprageneric names continue. Please report errors and corrections by contacting me via email.
CHECK for the latest updates on family nomenclature! and be sure to check out other sites.
While the names reported here are dynamic and subject to change, names at the family rank are much more stable than at other suprageneric ranks. A list of conserved family names (e.g., nom. cons.) is in App. IIA and IIB of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (Greuter et al., 1994). While provisions in the Code provide protection for the names, authorships and bibliographic data are not. By a special provision added to the Berlin Code, these data are protected presently for conserved names until the next Congress. In the data provided on family names in the Indices I have indicated the first place of valid publication as the earlier authors may ultimately be adopted. The starting date for vascular plant family names is 1753 although traditionally conserved names have been protected from Jussieu's Genera Plantarum published in 1789.
Recently Published Family Systems or Summaries of Families
- Bremer, K., B. Bremer & M. Thulin. 1995. Introduction to phylogeny and systematics of flowering plants. Department of Systematic Botany, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
- Bremer, K., B. Bremer & M. Thulin. 1996. Introduction to phylogeny and systematics of flowering plants. 2nd edition. Department of Systematic Botany, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
- Bremer, K., B. Bremer & M. Thulin. 1995 onward. Classification of flowering plants http://www.systbot.uu.se/additions/k_bremer-classification.html
- Brummitt, R.K. 1992. Vascular plant families and genera. Royal Botanic Garden, Kew.
- Cronquist, A.J. 1981. An integrated system of classification of flowering plants. Columbia University Press, New York
- --. 1988. The evolution and classification of flowering plants. 2nd. edit. New York Botanical Garden, Bronx.
- Dahlgren, G. 1989a. "The last Dahlgrenogram: System of classification of the dicotyledons," pp. 249-260. In: K. Tan, R.R. Mill & T.S. Elias (eds.), Plant taxonomy, phytogeography and related subjects. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.
- --. 1989b. An updated angiosperm classification. J. Linn. Soc. Bot. 100: 197-203.
- Greuter, W., R.K. Brummitt, E. Farr, N. Kilian, P.M. Kirk & P.C. Silva. 1993. NCU-3. Names in current use for extant plant genera. Regnum Veg. 129.c
- Gunn, C.R., J.H. Wiersema, C.A. Ritchie & J.H. Kirkbride, Jr. 1992. Families and genera of spermatophytes recognized by the Agricultural Research Service. U.S.D.A. Tech. Bull. 1976.
- Reveal, J.L. 1995 onward. Indices nominum supragenericorum plantarum vascularium http://matrix.nal.usda.gov:8080/star/supragenericname.html
- Takhtajan, A.L. 1997. Diversity and classification of flowering plants. Columbia University Press, New York.
- Thorne, R.F. 1992a. An updated phylogenetic classification of the flowering plants. Aliso 13: 365-389.
- --. 1992b. Classification and geography of the flowering plant. Bot. Rev. 58: 225-348.
- Watson, L. & M.J. Dallwitz. 1991. The families of angiosperms: Automated descriptions, with interactive identification and information retrieval. Aust. Syst. Bot. 4: 681-695.
- -- 1995 onwards. The families of flowering plants: Descriptions and illustrations. http://muse.bio.cornell.edu/delta/.
- Wielgorskaya, T. 1995. Dictionary of generic names of seeds plants. Columbia University Press, New York.
A SHORT ESSAY ON SUPRAGENERIC NOMENCLATURE
Names of taxa above the rank of family have not been rigorously studied, and the review here is only beginning. Provisions in the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature dealing with names above the rank of family are particularly vague. Of critical importance is that names above the rank of family published after 1 Jan 1935 must be accompanied with a description or diagnosis in Latin or a reference to a validly published description or diagnosis in Latin. Such names are not "transfers" and therefore do not have a parenthetical author. At the family rank and below, transfers are possible and parenthetical authors ought to be included although the Code is vague on this point. Presently, family names conserved in the Code are associated with parenthetical authorships when (a) the only basis for validation is the citation or (b) the proposing author cites a validating name.
Many aspects of the Code relating to suprageneric names seem to be unclear to many present-day workers. Ranks and the sequence of ranks is governed by Arts. 3-5. Arts. 16-19 deal exclusively with suprageneric names. The following articles are mentioned here because of the their importance to suprageneric names:
Art. 18.4 Any name published with a non-Latin ending is invalid. Thus, many of the names originally published in French and German, but often accepted today, are invalid.
Art. 32.1 Contrary to often accepted practice, all names regardless of rank must be accompanied by a validating description or diagnosis. Numerous modern authors simply use suprageneric names without concern for their validity.
Art. 32.4 After 1 Jan 1953 there must be a full and direct reference to the basionym or to any validating Latin description or diagnosis. Mere mention of an author name, or citation of a reference in the work does not constitute and full and direct reference.
Art. 32.6 Suprageneric names published with an incorrect Latin termination are to be corrected. Priority resides with who proposed the name, not who first supplied the correct ending.
Art. 33.3 This important article applies only to "new combinations or avowed substitutes." It allows errors in bibliographic citation to be corrected. No such provision exists for suprageneric names. Nonetheless, its principle has been applied to all ranks in the present study.
Art. 33.5 This critical article appears to be largely unknown. A taxon proposed at a misplaced rank is not validly published. Numerous present-day authors attribute the rank of tribe to names actually proposed as sections. Likewise, it is not uncommon to find the rank family recognized within a natural order (=family, see Arts. 18.2 and 19.2); such secondary names are invalid.
Art. 35. This article deals with indication of rank. This is particularly troublesome in the early literature. After 1 Jan 1953, a rank must be stated, before that date, it is open to interpretation.
Names published without a rank, or merely a term (e.g., Gruppe) are rankless, but often still valid. For purposes of priority, this is fixed when a rank is attributed to a name. Art. 35.4 is often ignored. If a name is not given a rank on one page, but names are given ranks elsewhere in the same publication (or different parts of the work), then rank might be establishable. More often, all names are rankless except in the discussion the author refers to a specific rank (e.g., all of Bartling's (1830) names below the rank of family are seemingly rankless; only in two places, and then in discussion, does he use a rank--tribe).
Often ranks are given but not in a consistent fashion. Lindley (1836) frequently referred to one of his families as a "tribe" but not in the sense of a rank. Below the rank of family he used tribe and section, yet in other instances no rank at all. In such cases, the names are (a) valid, (b) invalid, and (c) rankless but valid providing all other appropriate provisions of the Code were fulfilled.
An aspect of the Code that nearly everyone finds difficult is how indirect can an indirect reference be and still be a reference. The examples associated with Arts. 32.4 and 32.5 do provide considerable guidance. Art. 32 Ex. 5 clearly states that an indirect reference can be as simply as an author's name, while Ex. 7 reminds us that an indirect reference may be nothing more than a statement in the text alluding to another work with effectively published descriptions or diagnoses. These are relatively straight forward but often require reviewing an entire work for evidence of validity and not just the place where the name appears.
In the case of many suprageneric names one finds the reference in the form of a name, typically a descriptive name associated with one based on a generic stem. Here the author is proposing a new name based on a previously published name. But whose name? If the name has been published with a description by one author, but treated as a nom. nud. by another, is the mere mention of the name sufficient to make it an indirect reference to the author who provided the name with a description? In the present work, such indirect references have been associated with a description unless there is specific evidence to the contrary. When no evidence exists as to which author the person took the name from, the indirect reference is to the author of the name who provided a description.
Early authors who were particularly prolific, like Cassini, often evolved in both their use of ranks and in the use of Latinized names. Thus, when a subsequent author refers to '"Cass.'" for a name in a new rank, one can rarely be certain which of Cassini's many works they used. As Cassini initially used sections within three families he later considered to be tribes in one family, and published his names in both Latin and French, it makes a difference as to whether the name, say, at the rank of subfamily is a new name or a transfer. In the latter there would be a parenthetical authorship but not in the former.
Many other provisions of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature are important, some critically so. It is not possible presently to conserved names at the ranks of subfamily, tribe or subtribe (a special exception has been made for Papilionoideae) but only when the family name used is Leguminosae (see Art. 19.7). Under no circumstance may one use "Papilioneae" or "Papilioninae". Names below the rank of family are subject to strict priority; this may well prove particularly troublesome as the older literature is reviewed.
Above the rank of family, priority is not operative (Art. 11.9) and while one is urged to follow the principles of priority (Rec. 16.B), one is free to select any name desired. It is useful to follow the principle established by Cronquist, Takhtanjan and Zimmermann in their 1966 Taxon article on the names of the higher embryophytes. Instead of having Anthophyta and Dicotyledonae, two discriptive name, mixed with names based on a generic name (Magnoliales, Magnoliaceae), it seems best to use generically-based names throughout. Both types of names are permitted by the Code.
