Habenar'ia: from Latin habena, "a rein, thong or strap." Stearn says that in some species the spur is long and shaped like a strap, and the divisions of the lip are also long and strap-like. The genus Habenaria was published by Carl Ludwig Willdenow in 1805 and is called the rein orchids.

Hackel'ia: named for Josef Hackel (1783-1869), Czech botanist who collected plants in Bohemia and professor at the Lyceum of Leitmeritz (Litoměřice). The genus Hackelia was published by Philipp (Filip) Maximilian Opiz in 1839.

halepen'se: of or from Aleppo, northern Syria, the origin of the specimen described by Linneaus.

Hales'ia: named for Stephen Hales (1677-1761), English botanist, physiologist, and clergyman who pioneered

quantitative experimentation in plant and animal physiology. He was the first person to measure blood pressure. He also invented several devices, including a ventilator, a pneumatic trough and a surgical forceps for the removal of bladder stones. In addition to these achievements, he was a noted philanthropist and wrote a popular tract on alcoholic intemperance. He was born in Bekesbourne, Kent, England. heir to Baronetcy of Beakesbourne and Brymore, and was educated in Kensington and then at Orpington before attending Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in 1696. Although he was studying

divinity, he would have received his degree in the classics, mathematics, natural sciences and philosophy while in Cambridge.  Hales was admitted as a Fellow of Corpus Christi in 1703, the same year that he obtained the degree of Master of Arts, and was ordained as Deacon at Bugden, Cambridgeshire. He continued his theological and other studies in Cambridge, and attended chemistry lectures by Giovanni Francisco Vigani while there. His interest in biology, botany and physiology is presumed to date from that time. In 1709 he was ordained Priest at Fulham and became a Bachelor of Divinity in 1711. Hales remained in Teddington for the rest of his life, and was an assiduous and well-regarded. Minister, although he was subject to some criticism due to his experiments on animals. In 1718 Hales was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. Hales's fame as a scientist grew from 1718 onwards, and by the mid part of the 18th century he had achieved an international reputation. He was made a Doctor of Divinity by Oxford University in 1733. In his later years he received frequent visits from Frederick, Prince of Wales and his wife, Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, both of whom were interested in gardening and botany. He gave Princess Augusta advice on the development of Kew Gardens, and in 1751 he was appointed Clerk of the Closet to the Princess Dowager, following the death of Prince Frederick, a post he held until his death. Hales is best known for his Statical Essays. The first volume, Vegetable Staticks (1727), contained an account of experiments in plant physiology and chemistry; it dealt with transpiration, the loss of water from the leaves of plants, and prefigured the cohesion theory of water transport in plants. While Hales' work on the chemistry of air appears primitive by modern standards, its importance was acknowledged by Antoine Lavoisier, the discoverer of oxygen. The second volume, Haemastaticks (1733), described experiments on animal physiology including the measurement of the "force of the blood", i.e. blood pressure. He made casts of the trachea and bronchial trees of dogs and measured the water lost due to breathing. He also made wax casts of the ventricles of horses’ hearts, correctly descibing the mitral valve and aortic valve during systole and diastole, explained the pulsations of arteries in terms of their elasticity and attributed the resistance to blood flow to friction due to the passage of blood through small blood vessels. In the 18th century bad air was thought to be a cause of ill-health and death, and death and disease were common in overcrowded ships and prisons. Hales was one of several people in that time who developed forms of ventilators to improve air quality. Hales' ventilators were large bellows, usually worked by hand, although larger versions were powered by windmills. They were widely installed in ships, prisons and mines and were successful in reducing disease, and aerating the lower decks of Royal Navy vessels to combat dry rot in the hulls. Hales' ventilators were also used in preserving foods and drying grain. He also experimented with ways of distilling fresh water from sea water; preserving water and meat on sea-voyages, measuring depths at sea, measuring high temperatures, and wrote on a range of subjects including earthquakes, methods of preventing the spread of fires, and comparative mortality rates in relationship to rural and urban parishes. Hales died in his 84th year at Teddington in 1761 after a short illness. At his own request he was buried under the tower of the church where he had worked for so many years. A monument to Hales was raised by Princess Augusta in the south transept of Westminster Abbey after his death. The genus Halesia was published by John Ellis in 1759 and is called silverbell or snowdrop-tree.

halicaca'bum: Gledhill says "from an ancient Greek name from Halicarnassus." The common names of Cardiospermum halicababum are balloon-vine, heart seed, heart pea, and winter cherry, and the A. Vogel Plant Encyclopedia says "The species name 'halicacabum' is derived from the Greek word meaning “salt barrel” and refers to the rotund fruits.

halimifo'lia: with leaves like genus Halimium.

halimo'ides: resembling genus Halimium.

Hamamel'is: Stearn says "the Greek name for a plant with a pear-shaped fruit, possibly the medlar. The bark and twigs of H. virginiana supply the witch-hazel of pharmacy. The twigs are also a favorite choice of dowsers or water diviners." Hippocrates apprently used this name for the plant they called medlar. A website of the Adkins Arboretum in Maryland says: "Hamamelis comes from the Greek words, meaning “fruit” and “at the same time,” referring to the shrub’s unique feature of producing flowers as the previous year’s capsules continue to ripen. The common name “witch” may allude to the use of the flexible branches as dowsing or “witching” rods for water." The Latin name of medlar is Mespilus germanica which has been cultivated for its fruit since Roman times.The genus Hamamelis was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called witch hazel.

har'geri: named for Edgar Burton Harger (1867-1946), an American botanist and plant collector who was born in Oxford, Connecticut. He was a graduate of the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University, class of 1877. He became a surveyor and served in that capacity for many years. He was also a Judge of the Probate Court, Town Clerk and Representative in the state legislature, and served on the Board of Education in Oxford. He was an amateur taxonomist and active collector who did most of his work in the period 1885-1915. He was a member of the committee who compiled the Catalogue of Flowering Plants and Ferns of Connecticut (1910). He was a founding member of the Connecticut Botanical Society in 1903 and served as its President for 19 years.

Harperel'la: named for Roland McMillan Harper (1878-1966), an American botanist, geographer, naturalist, explorer and

writer. He was born in Farmington, Maine, and then moved with his family to Dalton, Georgia when he was 10, and then five years later to Americus, Georgia. He studied engineering at University of Georgia, 1894–1897, during which time he became interested in botany. By the time he graduated he had discovered and described the Cyperaceae species Scirpus georgianus. His PhD was presented to him by Columbia University in 1905 for his work on the flora of Georgia. He continued his career at the Alabama Geological Survey as a botanist and geographer and then worked at different times for the

American Museum of Natural History, the US National Herbarium, the US Department of Agriculture, Biltmore Forest School and the Arnold Arboretum. Harper gathered plant specimens throughout Florida, Georgia, Arkansas and New York, discovering a total of 30 new flowering plant species (15 of which bear his name), as well as the Apiaceae genus Harperella and the Floridian lily genus Harperocallis. He published over 500 papers, many on botany and also including some on more sociological topics such as “Significance of bachelors and spinsters” and “Corn bread, appendicitis, and the birth-date”. He is best remembered perhaps for his phytogeographical work and his Phytogeographical Sketch of the Altamaha Grit Region of Georgia (1906) in particular. He also published a study of the pine barren vegetation of Mississippi based on observations from car windows. His research interests included plant ecology and geography, systematic botany, soils, crops and weeds, forestry and controlled burning, demography, railroading, conservation, and photography. He also wrote for the Savannah Morning News and covered the settlement of Georgia's wiregrass region in the late 19th century. In later life Harper turned his attention more and more to sociological topics, being interested in demography, biostatistics and race relations (he was an advocate of white supremacy). A keen collector of all manner of things, he amassed some 1,500 train timetables and over 50,000 newspaper cuttings. He was an acquaintance of Nathaniel Lord Britton, the co-founder of the New York Botanical Garden.  He died in Tuscaloosa, Aabama, where he had moved with his wife. The genus Harperella was published in 1906 by Joseph Nelson Rose.

har'peri: see Harperella.

har'risii: named for Edward Harris III (1851-1921), an American naturalist and plant collector. I know next to nothing about this individual, except about his grandfather, father and son. His grandfather, Edward Harris, Sr. (1754-1822) was a merchant who came from England to Moorestown, New Jersey. His father, Edward Harris, Jr. (1799-1863), was a farmer, horse breeder, philanthropist, naturalist, and ornithologist who inherited the farm in 1822 and met John James Audubon in 1824 and accompanied him on two of his expeditions to observe birds and mammals of America, one in the spring of 1837 in the Gulf of Mexico, and another in 1843 along the Missouri River. Harris was commemorated by Audubon in the common names of the Harris's hawk, the Harris's sparrow, and the Harris's antelope squirrel, and by John Cassin in the Latin name of the buff-fronted owl, Aegolius harrisii. Edward Harris introduced the Percheron horse to America after a trip to France in 1839 and established the first Percheron breeding line in the United States. Edward Harris III lived in Moorestown until 1849. His son, Edward Harris IV (1879-1935) was a physician who graduated from Hahnemann Medical College in 1902 and moved to Cumberland, Maryland in 1904. He died of pneomonia. The species named for Edward Harris III is Solidago harrisii which he collected in 1910 at Cumberland, Maryland.

has'pan: Gledhill says from a Ceylonese vernacular name of unknown meaning. Apparently the epithet was originally printed as 'Halpan' in German botanist Paul Hermann's 1717 edition of his Musaeum Zeylanicum but was misprinted as 'Haspan' in Dutch botanist and physician Johannes Burman's Thesaurus zeylanicus printed in 1737 and from which Linnaeus quoted it when he published Cyperus haspan in his Species Plantarum in 1753.

hassleria'na: named for Emile Hassler (1861-1937), a Swiss physician, botanist and plant collector who concentrated mainly on the flora of Paraguay.

hasta'ta: spear-shaped with the basal lobes facing outward.

hastat'ulus: with small arrow-like thorns, diminutive of hasta, "spear."

hattoria'nus: named for Hattori Yasuyoshi, no information available.

hebecarpa: fuzzy-fruited. Stearn says with fruit covered in down, from Greek hebe, "youth, down of puberty", and karpos, "fruit."

Hedeo'ma: from the Greek hedus, "sweet," and osme, "odor," an ancient name for a strongly aromatic mint. The genus Hedeoma was published by Christiaan Hendrik Persoon in 1807 and is called american pennyroyal.

Hed'era: the classical name for ivy, this was supposedly the sacred plant of Bacchus, God of wine. The genus Hedera was published in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus.

hederifo'lia: with leaves like Hedera.

hedera'cea/hedera'ceus: of or pertaining to ivy, genus Hedera.

Hedyo'tis: sweet-eared, from Greek hedys, "sweet," and ous, otus, "ear," in reference to the sweet-scented, ear-shaped leaves of some species. The genus Hedyotis is commonly called starviolet, and many species are well-known medicinal plants. It was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

Helen'ium/helen'ium: said to be named by Linnaeus for Helen of Troy, according to the legend that these flowers sprang up from the ground where her tears were supposed to have fallen. The Greeks used this name for another plant and it was later reapplied by Linnaeus when he published the genus in 1753. Elecampane (Inula helenium) was supposed to have been taken to Pharos by Helen of Troy. Wikipedia adds this: "It was sacred to the ancient Celts, and once had the name "elfwort". The plant traditionally was held to be associated with the elves and fairy folk. Nicholas Culpeper considered elecampane to be ruled by Mercury and used it to warm a cold and windy stomach, to resist poison, to strengthen sight, and to clear internal blockages. The herb has been used since ancient Greek times. Theophrastus recommended using the plant in oil and wine to treat the bites of vipers, spiders and pine caterpillars in his Historia Plantarum. In Roman times, Apicius, a cookbook from the 1st century AD, describes it as a plant for testing whether honey is spoilt or not, the plant is immersed in the honey and then lit, if it burns brightly the honey is considered fine. The root was mentioned by Pliny in his Natural History both as a medicine and as a condiment. In Medieval Europe, the roots were candied and eaten as confectionery." The genus Helenium is called sneezeweed or bitterweed, and was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

heliantho'ides: resembling genus Helianthus.

Helian'thus: derived from two Greek words helios, "sun," and anthos, "flower," in reference to the sunflower's supposed tendency to always turn toward the sun. The genus Helianthus was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753, and is called simply sunflower.

heliop'sidis: from Greek helios, "the sun." The ITIS website and other sources gives the common name of Rudbeckia heliopsidis as sunfacing coneflower, so that provides a clue as to the meaning of this name.

Heliop'sis: from Greek helios, "the sun," and -opsis, "resembling." The genus Heliopsis was published in 1807 by Christiaan Hendrik Persoon.

heliosco'pia: sun-observing, sun-watching, Dioscorides' name alluding to flowers that track the sun's course.

he'lix: winding around.

Heliotrop'ium: from the Greek helios, "sun," and trope, "turning," thus meaning "sun-turning," either a reference to the summer solstice when the first described species bloomed, or to the turning of flowers toward the sun, a characteristic of many species known as heliotropism. The genus Heliotropium was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called heliotrope or turnsole.

helle'borine: hellebore-like.

Hellebor'us: FNA says only that this is the ancient name for this plant. The Online Etymology Dictionary has this: "late 14c., from Old French ellebore, from Latin elleborus, from Greek helleboros, the name given to various plants of both poisonous and medicinal qualities, reputed to cure madness; of uncertain origin. Perhaps literally "plant eaten by fawns," from Greek ellos/hellos "fawn." But Beekes writes, "The traditional etymology seems very doubtful; the word could well be non-IE, i.e. pre-Greek." The Beekes referred to is Robert Beekes who is the author of the Etymological Dictionary of Greek (2009). In a rather long article about Hellebore, Wikipedia says "The scientific name Helleborus could derive from the Ancient Greek word helléboros, the common name for H. orientalis, constructed from heleîn, "to injure," and borá, "food." It is also possibly from Greek, “fawn." The genus Helleborus was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

hel'leri: named for Amos Arthur Heller (1867-1944), American botanist who was one of the most prolific plant collectors

of western North America from 1892 to 1940 and whose specimens are included in the Herbarium of the California Academy of Sciences. Wikipedia provides the following information: He was born in Danville, PA, and achieved a B.A. degree and a Master’s degree in botany from Franklin & Marshall College. From 1896 to 1898, Heller was a professor of Botany at the University of Minnesota, following which he worked for the next couple of years on the Vanderbilt Expedition to Puerto Rico under the auspices of the New York Botanical Garden. He joined the California Academy of Sciences in San

Francisco as a professor of botany starting in 1905. He and his wife, Emily Gertrude Heller, founded the botanical journal Muhlenbergia and Heller continued to edit that journal until 1915. While living in Los Gatos, California, south of San Francisco from 1904 to 1908, Heller collected extensively in central California. He also obtained an impressive collection from Puerto Rico. In 1913, Heller moved to Chico, California, and taught at the local high school, but continued to collect botanical specimens. His first herbarium of over 10,000 sheets is at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden and his second herbarium and library is at the University of Washington, in Seattle. At the University of Washington, Heller's Puerto Rico plant collecting itineraries of 1900 and 1902–1903 and their utility for the historical study of endangered plants are housed. His wife  frequently collaborated with him both in the collection of specimens as well as illustrating his numerous publications. He collected on Santa Catalina Island in 1908, and as a young man botanized and collected extensively in the Southern Appalachians of North Carolina, including finding what came to be called Heller’s blazing star, Liatris helleri. His eldest daughter was Christine Albright Heller Bickett (Mrs. Albert T. Bickett) (1900-2000). (Photo credit: JSTOR)

Helo'nias: from the Greek helos, "a marsh," alluding to the habitat. The genus Helonias was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called swamp-pink or stud flower.

helvo'la: pale brownish yellow or yellowish brown. from the Latin helvus, "honey yellow."

Hemerocal'lis: from the Greek hemera, "day," and kallos, "beauty," thus meaning "beauty for a day," in reference to the fact that the blooms last only a single day. The genus Hemerocallis was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is commonly called day-lily.

Hemicar'pha: half-chaff, from Greek hemi, "half," and karpos, "chaff, splinter, twig, chip of straw, chip of wood," of uncertain application. The genus Hemicarpha, which among other names was commonly called small-flower halfchaff sedge, was published by Christian Nees von Esenbeck in 1834, and seems to have been replaced now by Lipocarpha.

hemisphaer'ica: hemispherical, in the shape of half a ball.

hemito'mon: I could find no specific meaning or derivation for this epithet, but the similar hemitomus means cut into two, deeply lobed along the length, presumably from the Greek hemi, "half," and tomos, "a cut or slice," of unknown application.

Hepat'ica: from Greek hepar, "the liver." Stearn says "There is a double allusion to the shape and color of the leaves whence the belief, according to the Doctrine of Signatures, that they would be good for complaints of the liver." According to the American Botanical Council, "The Doctrine of Signatures (DOS) is a widely cited theory that purportedly explains how humans discovered the medicinal uses of some plants. According to DOS, physical characteristics of plants (including shape, color, texture, and smell) reveal their therapeutic value." An interesting theory that goes back to Dioscorides and Galen proposes that herbs resembling various parts of the body can be used by herbalists to treat ailments of those body parts." The genus Hepatica was published by Philip Miller in 1754.

Herac'leum: many sources say that this epithet was named for the Greek mythological son of Zeus Heracles or Hercules, either because he was supposed to have used it first for medicine, or because he was a mortal of great size and strength, which relates to the large stature of some of its subspecies. The epithet Panax heracleum was used by Dioscorides, and that use of 'heracleum' may well have referred to Hercules, but David Hollombe says "when Linnaeus used it as a generic name in Hortus Cliffortianus he stated that it was named for the physician Heraclides, son of Hippocrates I and father of Hippocrates II." Heraclides lived probably sometime in the 5th century BCE. His son was Hippocrates of Kos, aka Hippocrates II (c.460-c.370BC), who is considered one of the most outstanding figures in the history of medicine and sometimes called the Father of Medicine. It's difficult to research a name like Heraclides because in that long distant past it was not an uncommon name and there were several physicians with that name. The genus Heracleum is called cow-parsnip or hogweed and was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

herba'cea: herbaceous, not woody, from Latin herbaceus, "grassy."

herbio'la: from the Latin herba for "an herb," and the -ola suffix being a diminutive, thus meaning "little plant."

hermaphrodi'ta: hermaphroditic, with flowers containing both stamens and ovary, from the Greek hermaphroditos, "a person partaking of the attributes of both sexes." A Greek mythological figure was the god Hermaphroditos who was the son of Hermes and Aphrodite, and who, in Ovid, was loved by the nymph Salmakis so ardently that she prayed for complete union with him and as a result they were united bodily, combining male and female characteristics.

Hes'peris: from the Greek hespera or hesperos, "of the evening," alluding to the marked fragrants the plants have at sunset and later. According to one mythological account, Hesperis was the daughter of Hesperus, the evening star which was the planet Venus in the evening. The genus Hesperis is called dame's rocket and was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

Heteran'themis: from the Greek heteros "different, various" and Anthemis, a genus in the Asteraceae which this taxon resembles, thus meaning "other or different Anthemis." The genus Heteranthemis was published by Heinrich Wilhelm Schott in 1818.

Heteran'thera: with different anthers, in most species one anther is different from the other two. The genus Heteranthera was published by Hipólito Ruiz López and José Antonio Pavón in 1794 and is called mud-plantain.

heterolep'is: from the Greek heteros, "different, dissimilar" and lepis, "scale," with scales that differ in some fashion..

hetero'phylla/hetero'phyllum: means that the leaves are different on the same plant.

Heterothe'ca: derived from the Greek heteros, "different," and theke, "box, case, cup, chest, container" from the unlike achenes of the ray and disk florets. The genus Heterotheca was published in 1817 by Alexandre Henri Gabriel de Cassini and is called camphorweed and golden-aster.

Heu'chera: named for Johann Heinrich von Heucher (1677-1747), professor of medicine and botanist at Wittenberg,

Germany. He was born in Vienna and moved with his family to Wittenberg when he was twelve where he was enrolled in the University of Wittenberg at that early age. He studied philosophy first, then medicine, and was educated extensively in the fields of zoology, minerology and geology, studied further at the Universities of Jena and Leipzig, and earned a Master’s degree in 1694 and a doctorate in medicine in 1700, then became a professor of philosophy. He participated in the founding of the first botanical garden at the University of Wittenberg, and published the first list of plants there.  He was

appointed in 1713 to be the personal physician of King Augustus II the Strong of Poland and moved to Dresden. He reorganized museums there and created a building for a collection of natural history, was appointed General and Special Director of the Scientific Galleries,  then became a professor of medicine at the University of Wittenberg. In 1729 he became a member of the Royal Society. A year before his death, in 1746, he sold his private library of about 4000 volumes including many precious scientific texts to the royal library. He wrote works of some importance in the fields of anatomy, botany and mineralogy. The genus Heuchera was named in his honor in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus and is pronounced HOI-ker-a, not HEW-ker-a. The common name is alumroot.

hexagonop'tera: from hex, "six," gona, "joint," and pterus or pteris, "wing," thus six-jointed wing.

Hexalec'tris: Gledhill says six-cock-combed, for the six-crested labellum. FNA expands on this by saying from the Greek hex, "six," and alectryon, "rooster," alluding to the six longitudinal fleshy crests on the floral lip. The genus Hexalectris was published by Constntine Samuel Rafinesque in 1825 and is called crested coralroot.

hexan'dra: with six stamens.

Hexasty'lis: hexa- in compound words signifies "six," so this name presumably means with six styles. The genus Hexastylis was published in 1825 by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque and is called heartleaf.