SC - Re: Grains of Paradise

[Robyn Probert]

Adamantius wrote:

>Afrimomum melegueta or cardamomum melegueta, depending on who you talk
>to. Just to make the issue even more crystal clear, there are types of
>chillies called melegueta peppers, also, presumably unrelated.

Biology hat on again....
There is a lot of confusion about botanical names. Species names are usually
made up of two words. The first is the genus name, the second is the species
descriptor. Two things with the same genus and different species names are
closely related. Two things with different genus names and the same species
descriptor are NOT related - the 'species' bit usually translates as some
sort of physical descriptor or could be the person who identified it. So
banksia longifolia and melaleuka longafolia are two completely unrelated
plants which both happen to have long leaves. "melegueta" is such a descriptor.

Even if things have different genus names, they may be related at a broader
Family level. So fennel, dill and carraway have different genus names, but
belong to the Family Umbelliflorae (their flowerheads look like umbrellas).
In the same way, all chillies and bell peppers belong to the Capsicum family
and all pumpkins, zucchini (courgettes), squash and so on are all Family
Curcurbitae.

There can be confusion because some common plants and animals were given
species names before the whole system was really worked out and
occassionally someone does some work which means something has to be
re-classified. On the whole it is a logical and useful system and makes
reading Culpeppers etc a lot easier!

(Taking off biology hat and replacing sca cook/laurel/pelican/etc hat)
Rowan





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Robyn Probert				
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