michaux'ii: named for French botanist and explorer André Michaux (1746-1802), most noted for his study of North

American flora. He was born in Satory near Versailles in France where his father managed farmland on an estate owned by the King. He was trained in agricultural sciences but also learned some Latin and Greek. When he was 23 he married but his wife died a year later in giving birth to his son. He took up the study of botany and became a student of Bernard de Jussieu. Some years later he studied botany in England and then in France and Spain. He went on a botanical mission to Persia in 1782, returning two years later with an extensive herbarium of plants. He was appointed Royal Botanist by Louis XVI and

sent to America in 1785. A botanical garden he established near Hackensack, New Jersey, failed due to harsh winters, but he perservered and established another in South Carolina which had a milder climate. Over the period 1785 to 1791 he shipped 90 cases of plants and seeds to France while at the same time introducing many species into America from elsewhere including crepe myrtle. He lost his source of income after the French monarchy collapsed, but Thomas Jefferson invited him to undertake an expedition of western exploration. The 18-year old Meriwether Lewis asked to be included but was turned down by Jefferson. He returned to France in 1796 and survived a shipwreck. In 1800 he sailed to Australia but left the ship in Mauritius, going on to explore the flora of Madagascar, where he died. Michaux wrote the first systematic botanical description of eastern North America, Flora Boreali-Americana, published posthumously in 1803.

micr-: from Greek mikros, "small."

micraden'ium: with small glands, from Greek mikros, "small," and aden. "a gland."

micran'tha: small-flowered.

Micranth'emum: small-flowered, from Greek mikros, "small," and anthemon or anthemom," "flower." The genus Micranthemum was published by André Michaux in 1803 and is called mudflower.

micranthemo'ides: resembling genus Micranthum.

micran'thera: having small anthers. The species Cardamine micranthera does in fact have very small anthers.

Micran'thes: small flowered, from Greek mikros, "small," and anthos, "flower." The genus Micranthes was published by Adrian Hardy Haworth in 1812 and is called saxifrage.

micran'thos/micran'thus: having small flowers.

microcar'pa: having small fruits.

microceph'alus: forming small heads.

microphyl'la: having small leaves.

microstach'ya: small-eared or -spiked.

Microste'gium: Gledhill says small cover, from micro, "small," and stegos, "a covering or roof, " alluding to the minute lemmas or bracts. The genus Microstegium was published by Christian Gottfried Daniel Nees von Esenbeck in 1836 and is variously called stiltgrass, Japanese grass or sasa grass.

Microthlas'pi: from the Greek mikros, "small," and genus Thlaspi, so a small version of Thlaspi. The name Thlaspi comes from the Greek thlaspis, a name used for cresses. The website of the WSSA (Weed Science Society of America) on field-pennycress (Thlaspi arvense) says: "Thlaspi, a name used by Dioscorides, is from the Greek thlao, "to flatten," and aspis, "shield," alluding to the shape of the fruits. "The genus Microthlaspi was published by Friedrich Karl Meyer in 1973 and is called pennycress.

Mikan'ia: named for Josef Gottfried Mikan (1743-1814), an Austrian-Czech botanist, entomologist and physician who was

born in the Czech Republic. He was a student in Dresden, Prague and Vienna, and served as a spa physician in Teplice. In 1773 he became an associate professor, and two years later was appointed a full professor of botany and chemistry at the University of Prague. In 1798 he became Rector of the University. He was the author of Catalogus plantarum omnium (1776), which he dedicated to the botanical garden in Prague, of which he was the Director. He was the father of zoologist, botanist and entomologist Johann Christian Mikan (1769-1844) who spent more than 30 years at the University of

Prague as a Professor of Natural History. JSTOR says this about his son: “…he made many botanical discoveries in the surrounding region of Bohemia, and ventured further afield in 1817 as part of the Austrian Expedition to Brazil. His explorations in Brazil from 1817 to 1818, led to his illustrated work Dellecctus Florae et Faunae Brasiliensis describing botanical and zoological species.” The genus Mikania was published in 1803 by Carl Ludwig Willdenow and is called climbing hempweed.

milia'cea/milia'ceum: pertaining to millet, millet-like.

Mil'ium: the Latin name for a millet grass. A huge number of species were once included in genus Milium but have now been placed in other genera. The genus Milium was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called millet grass or wood millet.

millefo'lium: many-leaved, literally "with a thousand leaves."

Mimo'sa: from the Greek mimos, "a mimic," alluding to the sensitive collapse when touched of the leaves of some species. The genus Mimosa was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called mimosa.

Mi'mulus: may come either from the Greek mimo, "an ape," because of a resemblance on the markings of the seeds to the face of a monkey, or, more likely, from the Latin mimulus, diminutive of mimus, "an actor or mime," because the flower is like the mouthpiece of one of the grinning masks worn by some classical actors. The genus Mimulus was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called monkeyflower or muskflower.

min'ima/min'imus: of diminutive size.

mi'nor: smaller, lesser (see major).

Minuar'tia: named for Juan Minuart (Joan Minuart y Parets (1693-1768), a Spanish (Catalan) apothecary-pharmacist and botanist at Barcelona and Madrid. He joined the army as a military apothecary, and traveled extensively through Spain, France, Italy and North Africa preparing with José Quer y Martínez a large herbarium with a multitude of seeds and live plants, with which they established a primitive botanical garden in Madrid. Fernando VI counted on him for the foundation of the Royal Botanical Garden of Madrid in 1755, moving the primitive garden of Aranjuez, founded by Felipe II, to a site in the grove of Migas Calientes, of which he was appointed Second Professor (with José Quer y Martínez as First Professor) and where he began teaching botany. He was a friend and correspondent of the great Linnaeus. The genus Minuartia was published by Pehr Loefling in 1753 and is called sandwort or stitchwort.

mi'nus: smaller.

miquel'ii: named for Friedrich Anton Wilhelm Miquel (1811-1871), Dutch botanist, professor of botany at Utrecht and

		Leiden, and author of works on the flora of Japan, Indonesia and elsewhere. He was born in Neuenhaus and studied medicine at the University of Groningen, where in 1833 he received his doctorate. After starting work as a doctor at the Buitengasthuis Hospital in Amsterdam, in 1835, he taught medicine at the clinical school in Rotterdam. In 1838 he became correspondent of the Royal Institute, which later became the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, and in 1846 he became member. He was professor of botany at the University of Amsterdam (1846–1859) and Utrecht University (1859–1871).

He directed the Rijksherbarium (National Herbarium) at Leiden from 1862. In 1866, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Miquel did research on the taxonomy of plants. He was interested in the flora of the Dutch Empire, specifically the Dutch East Indies and Suriname. Although he never traveled far, he knew through correspondence a large collection of Australian and Indian plants. He described many species and genera in important families like Casuarinaceae, Myrtaceae, Piperaceae and Polygonaceae. In total he published some 7,000 botanical names. Through his partnership with the German botanist Heinrich Göppert, he became interested in paleobotany, the study of fossil plants, notably the fossil cycads. Along with Jacob Gijsbertus Samuël van Breda, Pieter Harting and Winand Staring, he was in the first commission to create a geological map of the Netherlands, which was published in 1852 by Johan Rudolph Thorbecke. He authored several important books on the flora of the Dutch East Indies, but never collected plants in Asia, though his name often appears on herbarium labels. He accumulated large collections by correspondence with collectors and herbaria in Australia and Indonesia. Among his works were Genera Cactearum (1839) and Florae Indiae Batavae (1855-1859). Miquel died in Utrecht at the age of 59 in 1871, after which he was succeeded as the director of the National Herbarium by Willem Frederik Reinier Suringar. From his estate, the Miquel fund was established, which provides financial support to botanists at the University of Utrecht. The former home of the director of the botanical gardens in the city center of Utrecht is called "Miquel's House."

Mirab'ilis: Latin for "miraculous, amazing, wondrous or wonderful," from mīror, “to marvel at,” and‎ -bilis, “able,” from mirus, “wonderful." The genus Mirabilis was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called umbrella-wort or four o'clock.

Miscan'thus: from the Greek mischos, "stalk," and anthos, "flower," referring to the spikelets. The genus Miscanthus was published by Nils Johan Andersson in 1855 and is called eulalia or silvergrass.

Misopa'tes: Gledhill gives the meaning as reluctant to open. FNA says "a Greek plant name used by Dioscorides probably from misos, "to hate," and pateo, "to trample," alluding to the erect stems. Another source says the Latin verb pateo means "to be open," referring to the flowers that are reluctant (hate) to open (the two lips). The genus Misopates was published in 1840 by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque.

missourien'sis: of or from Missouri.

Mitchel'la: named for John Mitchell (1711-1768), a colonial American physician and botanist. He was born in 1711 in Lancaster County, Virginia to a relatively well off merchant and planting family. He went to Scotland to study at the University of Edinburgh, earning an M.A. in 1729, then studying medicine until 1731 but without receiving a degree. He then returned to Virginia to practice medicine, and by 1735 had set up his practice at Urbanna. In his spare time he studied natural history and became known as a botanist, and he was elected to the original American Philosophical Society in 1744 In 1745 Mitchell argued that a series of epidemics occurring in Virginia were due to unsanitary troop ships from Britain. Mitchell and his wife Helen suffered from ill health, so in 1746 they moved to Britain's milder climate. En route, their ship was captured by a French privateer; although they were released, their belongings (and Mitchell's botanical samples) were confiscated and they arrived in London with only Mitchell's small fund of investments to their name. Mitchell did not try to compete with the metropolitan doctors; instead, he established himself as an expert on exotic botany. He was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society in November 1748, his candidature citation describing him as "A Gentleman of great merit and Learning, who Some time Since communicated to the Royal Society a very curious dissertation concerning the Colour of the skin in Negroes, and who from his long residence in Virginea, & from his great application to the Study of Natural history, especially Botany, is very well acquainted with the vegetable productions of North America, being desirous of being admitted a fellow of the Royal Society, is recommended by us from our personal knowledge of him as highly deserving the Honour he desires, as we believe he will be (if chosen) a usefull and valuable member of our Body." He continued to live in London, often touring the country estates of his aristocratic friends/patrons, occasionally writing articles and pamphlets, and living the life of a gentleman of modest means. His wife probably died soon after they reached London; Mitchell himself died in 1768. Mitchell's main claim to historical fame is his large map of the North American colonies called the Mitchell Map that was first published in Philadelphia then in London in 1755 and was reprinted several times during the second half of the 18th century. It is the most comprehensive and perhaps largest map of eastern North America made during the colonial era and was used as a primary map source during the Treaty of Paris for defining the boundaries of the newly independent United States. It remained important for resolving border disputes between the United States and Canada as recently as the 1980s. Mitchell wrote a paper in 1744 called An Essay upon the Causes of the Different Colours of People in Different Climates, submitted to the Royal Society in London by his correspondent Peter Collinson. In the paper, Mitchell claimed that the first race on earth had been a brown and reddish colour. He wrote "that an intermediate tawny colour found amongst Asiatics and Native Amerindians" had been the “original complexion of mankind”, and that other races came about by the original race spending generations in different climates. (Excerpted from Wikipedia) The genus Mitchella was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called partridge-berry.

mitchelliana: named for Elisha Mitchell (1793-1857), educator, geologist, Presbyterian minister, and explorer. He was born

in Washington, Connecticut. Prepared for college by the Reverend Azel Backus at his school in Bethlehem, Connecticut, Elisha Mitchell was graduated from Yale University in 1813. After leaving Yale, Mitchell taught first at Union Hall Academy, and then served as principal of Union Academy in New London. In 1816 he returned to Yale as a tutor, and the following year he took a brief theological course at Andover, Massachusetts. In 1817 he was recommended for a teaching position in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and arrived there the following year to take up duties as professor of mathematics and

natural philosophy. In 1821 Mitchell was ordained by the Presbytery of Orange in Hillsborough; he continued to combine preaching with his education and scientific interests for the remainder of his life. Beginning in 1825 he taught chemistry, geology, and mineralogy at the university which continued for thirty-two years. He took over and completed the geological survey of North Carolina begun by his former classmate at Yale, Denison Olmsted. He also surved as bursar and accountant for the University and stood in for the President when he was away from Chapel Hill. As bursar, Mitchell was in charge of grounds and buildings belonging to the university and worked to increase the variety of flowers, shrubs, and trees on the campus. He encouraged a tax-supported system of common schools, not only because he believed that educated citizens were essential to the improvement of society, but also because such schools would provide jobs for women as teachers. Mitchell's interest in the education of women is also evident from the classical education he prescribed for his own daughters. He was in favor of material improvements such as turnpikes, schools, and the development of towns and villages. On the question of slavery, he supported the southern point of view. After coming to Chapel Hill, he acquired slaves himself and, in 1848, preached a sermon arguing that slavery was a system of property holding under God's law and as such was no worse than any other form of property ownership. He became embroiled in a controversy regarding the height of what Mitchell believed to be North Carolina’s highest mountain and the highest point in North America east of the Mississippi River. Claims to the contrary were made, but in 1857 he made a return trip to climb Black Mountain in an attempt to justify his previous measurements and prove his claims, and on 27 June, leaving his son and guides, he started out alone, was caught in a thunderstorm, and apparently fell down a waterfall and drowned in the pool below. His body was not found for several days. He was first buried in Asheville, but then, with formal ceremonies, his remains were buried on the peak he had climbed. In 1881-1882 the U.S. Geological Survey upheld Mitchell's measurement of the highest peak on the Black Mountain and officially named it Mount Mitchell. Today his grave is marked by a memorial plaque and observation tower, and the surrounding area has been established as a state park. (Information from the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography)

mitchellia'num: referring to Mt. Mitchell in the Blue Ridge of North Carolina where Hypericum mitchellianum was found.

Mitel'la: diminutive of the Greek mitra, "a bishop's cap," in reference to the fruits. Wikipedia says the genus name means "little mitre," from Latin mitra with the diminutive suffix -ella, since the flowers are said to resemble bishop's headdresses. Latin mitra comes from Greek mítrā, "girdle, headband, or turban." The genus Mitella was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called miterwort.

Mitreo'la: with a small cap, diminutive of mitra, mitrae, "a head-band, head dress," or mitratus, "wearing a head-band or mitre." referring to the mitre-shaped capsule. A common name is hornpod. The genus Mitreola was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1758 and is called hornpod or miterwort.

Modio'la: from the Latin modiolus, "the nave of a wheel," because of the shape of the fruit. The genus Modiola was published by Conrad Moench in 1794 and is called glade mallow.

Moehring'ia: named for German physician, botanist and ornithologist Paul Heinrich Gerhard Möhring (1710-1791). He

was born in Jever in Lower Saxony the eldest of eight children, and the son of a rector and pastor. He studied medicine at the Gymnasium Academicum in Danzig and then attended the University of Wittenberg graduating with a doctorate in 1733. He then began practicing general medicine in his hometown. Prince Johann Ludwig II of Anhalt-Zerbst appointed him in 1743 as his personal physician and in that same year he married. In 1752 he published a work of ornithology on the systematics of birds entitled Avium Genera which divided birds into four classes, prefiguring modern systems of avian

classification. He carried on a correspondence with naturalists such as Wolther van Doeveren, Albrecht von Haller, Lorenz Heister, Carl von Linnaeus, Hans Sloane, Christoph Jacob Trew and Paul Gottlieb Werlhof. He became blind at the age of 68 but continued his work with the help of one of his sons and nephew until his death. The genus Moehringia is called grove sandwort and was named for him by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

mohr'ii: named for Charles Theodore Mohr (1824-1901), a German pharmacist and botanist who lived and worked in the

United States. He was born in Esslingen am Neckar in southern Germany, the son of a lamb farmer. He spent his first three years of school in his hometown and in 1833 the family moved to nearby Denkendorf where his father founded a mustard and vinegar factory. Later that year, August Mohr suddenly died at the age of 38. Young Charles worked in the family business and developed an interest in botany through his great-uncle, a forester at the Denkendorf convent, and his uncle's son, a student at the agricultural college in Hohenheim. He self-studied several books on botany and developing a taste for natural

science, and attended the Polytechnical school in Stuttgart in autumn of 1842 studying chemistry. In 1845 he went to Suriname with the explorer August Kappler where Mohr ventured into the interior of the country collecting plants for European florists and herbariums, but attacks of fever sickened him and he returned to Germany. His brother Paul Heinrich had been living in London for some time, and in 1848 they decided to emigrate to the United States. They went to New York and then Cincinnati but soon were hit by gold fever and in 1849 they set out for the gold mines of the Sierra Nevada. Health considerations once again forced him to abandon this occupation and return to Cincinnati. A brief stint as a farmer in Indiana was followed by a move to Louisville, Alabama, where he found more time for his botanical studies which were supported by the Swiss paleobotanist and bryologist Leo Lesquereux. In 1857 he travelled south and worked as a pharmacist in Vera Cruz and Orizaba, Mexico, but was forced to return to the United States by the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution. At the end of 1857, he opened the first German pharmacy in Mobile, Alabama, whose business development was hurt by the outbreak of the American Civil War. The confederate government tasked him with examining the medicines for their army. During the course of the war, his pharmacy was destroyed once, but he immediately built it up again. Despite these troubled times, Mohr continued his botanical work and contributed a collection of mosses from southern Alabama to Lesquereux's 1884 work Mosses of North America. In his pharmacy laboratory, Mohr began examination of fertilizers and minerals, as well as exploring the woods of Alabama for commercial timbers and other valuable natural resources. The results of this work was publicized in 1879 under the title "The Forests of Alabama and Their Products."  On behalf of the Department of Agriculture in Washington, D.C., who took notice of Mohr's work, he undertook a wide-reaching forest-botanical study. Aside from this, he was busy working for Harvard University and other institutions, giving talks at large congresses and conducting a topographical examination of north Florida in 1882. He was given an honorary doctoral degree by the University of Alabama in 1893 in recognition of his work, and in 1900 moved to Asheville, North Carolina, where he worked on the large Biltmore Herbarium. His publication Plant Life of Alabama, which took over 40 years to complete, was his most meaningful work.

moles'ta: troublesome, annoying, unmanageable, disturbed (taxonomically?, or agriculturally?).

molestifor'mis: not sure what this means except that it comes from the roots molesta, "troublesome, annoying, unmanageable," and -formis, from the Latin forma, "shape, figure, appearance, nature."

mol'le/mol'lis: smooth, or with soft velvety hair, from Latin mollis or molle, "soft."

Mollu'go/mollu'go: an old name for the genus Galium and transferred to this genus in the family Aizoaceae possibly because of the similarly whorled leaves, and now placed in its own family, the Molluginaceae or carpet-weeds. The nme was originally applied to the species Galium mollugo. Merriam-Webster says it derives from the Latin for stickseed, from mollis soft. The genus Mollugo was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called carpetweed.

monanthogy'nus: from Greek monos, "one, single," anthos, "flower," and gyne, "a woman, female." The species Croton monanthogynus is called one-seeded croton.

Monar'da: named for Nicholás Bautista Monardes (1493-1588), a botanist and the most widely read Spanish physician in

Europe. He was born in Seville, Spain, the son of an Italian bookseller. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1530 and a degree in medicine in 1533, both from the University of Alcalá de Henares, following which he began practicing medicine in Seville. In 1547 he graduated from the University of Alcalá de Henares with a doctorate in medicine. He married Catalina Morales who was the daughter of a professor of medicine at Seville. He became involved in the publishing of medical works and was particularly interested in drugs and herbs that came to Spain from the Americas. His book De Secanda

Vena in pleuriti Inter Grecos et Arabes Concordia published in 1539 concerned Greek and Arab medicine. Other topics he wrote about included toxicology, therapeutics, phlebotomy, iron, and snow. His medical practice was successful and he also maintained businesses which included the import of medicinal drugs. He apparently believed that tobacco smoke was a cure for many troubles. His best known work was Historia medicinal de las cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias Occidentales which was translated into English with the name Joyfull News out of the New Found World. He gathered information about these new herbs from soldiers, merchants, Franciscans, royal officials, women and other people he met who were hanging around the Seville docks where the ships came in. He also published works on blood-letting and cases of pleuritis, and the medical application of roses. In 1570 Francisco Hernandez was sent to the New World by King Philip II and Monardes may have played a part in encouraging this assignment. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1588 eleven years after the death of his wife. The genus Monarda was published by Linnaeus in 1753 and is called bergamot, beebalm or horsemint. (Photo credit: Real Academia Nacional de Medicina de Espana)

monel'lii: named for Johannes Monellius (Jean Monelle or Jean de Monelle), a 17th century French horticultural expert who introduced this plant to his native land, and was honored with the name by Carl Linnaeus. Another source say he was an Italian botanist but I think this may have been an error.

monen'sis: Gledhill says " from Anglesey or the Isle of Man in northwest Wales, both formerly known as Mona. Anglesey, which was recorded in Latin as Mona and is still known as Môn in modern Welsh, was a place of resistance to Roman rule because it was an important centre for the Celtic Druids and their religious practices.After the conquest, there are no surviving Roman sources that mention Anglesey. As far as the Isle of Man is concerned, Wikipedia says "The Old Irish form of the name is Manau or Mano. Old Welsh records named it as Manaw. In the 1st century AD, Pliny the Elder records it as Monapia or Monabia, and Ptolemy (2nd century) as Monœda or Monarin. The name is probably cognate with the Welsh name of the island of Anglesey, Ynys Môn, usually derived from a Celtic word for mountain." Coincya monensis is native to western Europe and Morocco.

monnier'i: named for French botanist Louis Guillaume Le Monnier (sometimes written as Lemonnier) (1717-1799). He

had been a student of Bernard de Jussieu and was a close acquaintance of de Jussieu’s nephew, Antoine-Laurent. He was also a colleague of the botanist Andre Michaux. In 1758 he became professor of botany at the Jardin des Plantes (on the death of Antoine de Jussieu) and doctor to Louis XVI. In 1786 he was succeeded as professor of botany by René Louiche Desfontaines. He was appointed by King Louis XV head of the botanical garden of the Trianon at Versailles and introduced many plants to French horticulture. His work in physics included the Leyden jar experiment, by which he established that water

is one of the best electrical conductors and that the surface area, not the mass, of a conducting body determines its electrical charge. His research on electricity produced by storms confirmed the theories of Benjamin Franklin. His publications include Leçons de physique expérimentale, sur l'équilibre des liqueurs et sur la nature et les propriétés de l'air (1742) and Observations d'histoire naturelle faites dans les provinces méridionales de France, pendant l'année 1739 (1744). His brother was the astronomer Pierre Charles Lemonnier.

monogy'na: with a single ovary.

Monotro'pa: from the Greek monos, "single," and tropos, "a turn" or trope, "a turning," thus meaning "turned or directed to one side," alluding to the one-sided inflorescence. The genus Monotropa was published in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus and is called indian pipe or pinesap.

Monotrop'sis: from Latin, genus Monotropa and -opsis, "resemblance," from its resemblance to Monotropa. The genus Monotropsis was published in 1817 by Ludwig David von Schweinitz and is called sweet pinesap.

monspelien'sis: Stearn's Dictionary of Plant Names says: "Of Montpellier in southern France, Latinized as Mons Pessulanus."

monta'na/monta'num/monta'nus: of the mountains.

Mon'tia: named for Giuseppe Monti (1682-1760), Italian botanist and professor of botany at Bologna. He was born

in Bologna, and from his adolescence he was educated in Latin literature, then he devoted himself to the studies of chemistry and botany. Until the age of 40 he worked as a chemist. He was a passionate student of botany, and corresponded with the major naturalists of his time, William Sherard, Herman Boerhaave, Jan Commelin, the Jussieus, Michelangelo Tilli, and Giulio Pontedera. In 1719 he wrote the first catalogue of the plants growing in the Bolognese countryside, giving special attention to grasses and similar of which he annotated the etymology, the distinctive characters, the medical proprieties and the

synonyms. Thanks to his fame, he was appointed as Professor at the new Instituto Bolognese, being already a member of the Academy of Sciences of which he was elected president in 1730 and 1736. After two years he got the teaching post of Natural History and Botany. From 1722 until his death he was the Director of the Bologna Botanical Garden. His son Gaetano Lorenzo Monti (1712–1797) was also a botanist who continued work at the same botanical garden. His herbarium consisted of 10,000 specimens representing 736 genera and more than 2.500 species. His collection also included specimens from Ulisse Aldrovandi, an Italian naturalist and the moving force behind Bologna's botanical garden, one of the first in Europe. Monti discovered a fossil jawbone in the Alps and used it as support for the Biblical flood and both he and his son were among the last defenders of diluvialism among the naturalists of the period. In 1753, Carl Linnaeus published the genus Montia in his honor and then in 1898, botanist Otto Kuntze published Montiopsis, a genus of flowering plants from South America belonging to the family Montiaceae. (Photo credit: Orto Botanico ed Erbario - Università di Bologna).

Morel'la: probably a diminutive of Morus, the mulberry. The genus Morella was published by João de Loureiro in 1790 and is called bayberry, wax-myrtle or candleberry.

Morican'dia: named for Moise Étienne Moricand (1779-1854), a Swiss naturalist and researcher of floras of America and

Italy who was interested in botany, mineralogy, entomology, and malacology. I have no information about his education or early life other than having been born in Geneva. JSTOR provides this thumbnail description of his career: “Moricand's first profession was as a commercial traveller in Italy for the Swiss watch industry, a trade he was entered into by his parents at the age of just 12. He did not return to Geneva, his birthplace, until the Restoration years. In Italy, Moricand met Italian scholars and collected plants and minerals in Tuscany, Naples and Venice. Upon his return to Geneva in 1814 he continued to

pursue his interests, making the acquaintance of A.P. de Candolle, with whose help he dedicated himself to studying botany and determining the specimens he had collected in Italy. The first volume of his Flora Veneta was published in 1820. Following this, he began to look at exotic vegetation, especially from South America, and in 1833-1846 published Plantes nouvelles d'Amérique, based chiefly on collections of J.L. Berlandier [plants of the USA and Mexico], J.S. Blanchet [plants from Brazil] and J.A. Pavón [plants from Peru and Chile]. Moricand used his connections with these collectors and others to boost the collections of Geneva's Muséum d’histoire naturelle, of which he was a founding member in 1818, treasurer and secretary. Moricand's herbarium, numbering more than 54,000 specimens at the end of his life, contained material from all over the world, again collected by him and those with whom he had built relationships. It was given to the Conservatoire botanique de la ville de Genève by his son in 1908.” Moricand was an early member of the Société des Naturalistes, which later became the Société helvétique des sciences naturelles. He also financed, with de Candolle, a collecting journey to Puerto Rico by Heinrich Wydler. Between 1820-1851 he published 11 papers on botany, in which he described 110 taxa (including three genera), and six papers in which he introduced 72 malacological taxa. His son, Jacques André Moricand (1823-1877), was also active in Geneva, working with his father and and publishing four malacological papers within a relatively short time (1853-1860), with 16 new species. Like his father, hr botanized in his spare time, supporting himself as a merchant and a stockbroker. Both fathrr and son have been described as amateur botanists. The genus Moricandia was published by de Candolle in 1821.

morrow'ii: named for Dr. James H. Morrow (1820-1865), an American medical doctor, agriculturist, botanist, and taxidermist of South Carolina. I have little information about his early life, but he was educated at Willington, S.C., by Moses Waddell, a famous American educator and minister in antebellum Georgia and South Carolina, received a B.A. in 1843 from Franklin College (later the University of Georgia), and studied medicine in Philadelphia at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1846. He was apparently at one point, perhaps before attending Franklin College, at Davidson College, and the College has confirmed that they have records of his having been there in the class of 1843 but that he did not graduate. A letter he wrote to his parents from Davidson in July, 1840 says "Next session Mr. Robinson wishes me to be a gardiner. This will be to my advantage. Two other students were expelled this week for having fire-arms and shooting a dog. No person regrets their leaving, I believe as they were very low and bad boys." He had an extensive background in natural history and agriculture when Secretary of State Edward Everett appointed him to serve as agriculturist with the U.S. expedition to Japan, led by Commodore Matthew Perry, in February 1853.
President Millard Fillmore had been determined to open diplomatic and commercial relations with Japan, despite that island nation’s strong tradition of cultural isolation. To force the Japanese government to open its borders to Americans merchants, Fillmore authorized in 1852 a naval expedition led by Commodore Matthew C. Perry. Besides armed vessels to intimidate the Japanese, the U.S. government also loaded supply ships with samples of American products, and enlisted a physician and botanist, Dr. James Morrow (1820–1865) of South Carolina, to gather samples of Japanese plants for scientific study and for propagation at a new greenhouse on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. Morrow studied and illustrated plant specimens and agriculture in Japan, China, Singapore and Java and wrote a daily journal that was later published. His illustrations were never published and most of them were lost. Dr. Morrow and an American-born translator spent nearly eighteen weeks collecting samples of many hundreds of native plants that were unknown to Western science at that time. He returned to the United States with 17 cases of plants, nearly 2,000 botanical samples, including dried specimens pressed into large paper folios and living material packed into Wardian cases. After the expedition, material was sent to a number of botanists including Asa Gray, F. Boott, D.C. Eaton, W.H. Harvey and W.S. Sullivant who published accounts of various plant groups. A book, A Scientist With Perry in Japan, The Journal of James Morrow, was published in 1947 by Allan B. Cole. During the Civil War, he was appointed surgeon to the fort on Morris Island and later transferred to James Island. David Hollombe added the interesting piece of information that Morrow was married to Jane Penny (born 1824) less than a month before his death, and she lived to the age of 80.

Mor'us: from the classical Latin name morum for Morus nigra, the mulberry. The genus Morus was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called mulberry.

moscha'ta/moscha'tus: from Latin moschatus, "having a musky scent."

moscheu'tos: Gledhill gives this: "a vernacular name for swamp rose-mallow, Hibiscus moscheutos." A gardening website of North Carolina State University says moscheutos is Latin for "mush-scented."

Mos'la: all I could find about this epithet was in Quattrocchi's CRC World Dictionary of Plant Names, to wit: "from the vernacular name in India." The genus was published by Carl Johann Maximowicz in 1875 and is simply called mosla.

Xmoultonensis: a hybrid oak species with parents Q. phellos and Q. shumardi, referring to the Moulton Valley of the Tennessee River, Lawrence County, Alabama.

mucrona'ta/mucrona'tum/mucrona'tus: mucronate, with a short, abrupt tip.

Muhlenbergia/muehlenberg'ii: named for Gotthilf Heinrich Ernst Muhlenberg (1753-1815) (originally Mühlenberg), son of

Henry Melchior Mühlenberg, a German Lutheran minister who came to the United States in 1742. Gotthilf was born in Trappe, Pennsylvania, educated with his brothers in Halle, Germany, and returned to America in 1770, at which time he was also ordained a Lutheran minister and worked for several years as his father's assistant. He labored as a pastor for several congregations throughout his life, but devoted his leisure hours to the study of the natural sciences, botany in particular. He was a pioneer botanist of the highest rank and was honored by having a number of plants and even a genus named for

him. His flora of the Lancaster, Pennsylvania, area included some 450 genera and 1000 species, and his first formal publication, Catalogus plantarum Americae septentrionalis, was released in 1813. He corresponded with many of the leading botanists of the day, and was visited, among others, by Alexander von Humboldt. He sent many specimens to Carl Ludwig Willdenow who published many of his discoveries in his Species plantarum. He was a member of a number of scientific societies in several countries, and his works are considered standards in the field. His manuscript on grasses was published two years after his death. He was the first President of Franklin College, serving in that capacity from 1787 to 1815, and both his son and grandson became Lutheran ministers, the latter, Frederick Augustus, becoming the first President of Muhlenberg College. The genus Muhlenbergia was published by Johann Christian Daniel von Schreber in 1789 and is called muhly.

multifi'da: many times divided.

multiflo'ra/multiflor'um: many-flowered, from multi-, "many," and florum, "flower."

munsonia'na: named for Thomas Volney Munson (1843-1913), often referred to as T.V. Munson, American horticulturist

and breeder of grapes in Texas. He was born in Astoria, Illinois. In the 1860s he taught school in Illinois for three years, and in 1870 he graduated from the University of Kentucky in Lexington where he worked as a professor of science in 1870–71, a position he held for only a year due to his desire to be fully involved with the grape industry. Following the completion of his education, he married and moved to Lincoln, Nebraska, where he began investigating various species of native grapes and the possibility of producing new varieties by cross-pollination and hybridization. These experiments were

not successful and in 1876 he moved to Denison, Texas, to join two of his brothers who were involved in insurance and real estate businesses. He soon became heavily engaged with grapes, and for the rest of his life he traveled extensively throughout Texas and forty other states, as well as Mexico, covering more than 50,000 miles by rail and hundreds of miles on horseback and by foot. He once wrote that these trips "rekindled my passion for experimental work with grapes." He was the founder of the Texas Horticultural Society and its president, a life member of the American Horticultural Society, and vice-president of the American Pomological Society. He wrote Native Trees of the Southwest under the direction of the United States Department of Agriculture and submitted a similar thesis in 1883 to satisfy requirements for the master's degree at the Kentucky Agricultural College. In the 1880s, Munson worked on a monograph on native grapes that was to be illustrated by William Henry Prestele, the first artist appointed to the staff of the recently formed Pomological Division of the United States Department of Agriculture in Washington, D.C. This work was never published in its intended form, but was the basis of the book he published in 1909, Foundations of American Grape Culture, regarded as one of the founding texts of American grape breeding and widely referenced even today. In 1885 he exhibited in New Orleans for the American Horticultural Society a complete classified herbarium of all known species of American grapes, and in 1893 he exhibited his collection of grape species at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago. In 1888, Munson was the second American, after Thomas Edison, to be named a Chevalier du Mérite Agricole by the French government, an honor which resulted from his work providing European grape growers with phylloxera-resistant rootstocks which allowed them to recover from the devastating epidemic of the late 19th century. In 1898 he was elected as a foreign corresponding member of the Société Nationale d'Agriculture de France and as an honorary member in the Société des Viticulteurs de France. In 1906 the University of Kentucky gave him a Doctor of Science degree. He died in Denison and in 1975 Grayson Community College in the Sherman-Denison area established a Thomas Volney Munson Memorial Vineyard to recognize his contribution to horticulture and to cultivate and preserve many of the Munson grape varieties. In 1988 the T. V. Munson Viticulture and Enology Center opened next to the vineyard. He had seven children. (Photo credit: Find-a-Grave)

mura'le/mura'lis: growing on walls, from Latin murus, "a wall," and muralis, "of a wall."

Murdan'nia: named for Ali Murdan (name sometimes given as Aly Murdan, Murdan Aly, and Munshí Murdan Alí), an Indian plant collector who was a botanist at the Saharanpur Botanic Gardens in India and an expert of Himalayan flora. He worked for the author of the genus Murdannia, John Forbes Royle, who published it in 1840. A common name is dewflower.

murica'ta/murica'tum: muricate, as in a surface roughened by means of hard points or sharp projections. A website of the San Diego State University adds "muricate, with coarse, radially elongate, rounded protuberances, longer than wide." The Wiktionary website says the Latin muricatus has several meanings, among which are having a pointed shape and rough with short, hard points, and comes from murex, "a pointed rock or stone." Merriam Webster gives the current definition of muricate as roughened with sharp hard points, and says it etymology is "from Latin muricatus, pointed like a purple fish, from muric- or murex, "purple shell," and -atus, "-ate." I think the botanical sense is simply "covered with short, sharp points."

mur'inum: of mice, mouse-gray, like a mouse, from Latin mus or muris, "a mouse," and murinus, "belonging to mice, mouse-like."

Muscar'i: Umberto Quattrocchi's World Dictionary of Plant Names says: "A Turkish name recorded by Clusius in 1583; Latin muscus, "moss, musk;" and Stearn's Dictionary of Plant Names says: "Turkish name recorded by Clusius in 1583, the bulbs of Muscari muscarimi (M. moschatum) being received from Constantinople under the names Muscari, Muschorimi or Muscurimi, meaning musk of the Romans (i.e. Greeks), or Muschio greco (Greek musk), referring to the sweet aromatic scent of the flowers, hence from Persian mushk, Sanskrit mushka, testicle. The source of musk is a scent gland or 'pod' of the male musk-deer (Moschus moschifer)." The following is quoted from the Encyclopaedia Romana: "Humanist and botanist, Carolus Clusius, the Latinized version of Charles de l'Ecluse (1526-1609), was most responsible for introducing the tulip (and the potato) to the Netherlands, transforming gardens there and throughout northern Europe. In 1573, he had been invited by the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II to establish a botanical garden in the capital at Vienna. At the time, botany was not a discipline in its own right but was considered a branch of medicine, the plants themselves of interest only for their medicinal properties. Clusius was one of the first to recognize them for their own sake, classifying plants according to their color and shape. Indeed, Clusius had become a physician to better study botany, traveling all over Europe in search of new specimens." The genus Muscari was published by Philip Miller in 1754 and is called grape-hyacinth.

muscitox'icum: Gledhill says fly-inebriating, poisonous to flies, from Latin musca, "fly."

mutab'ilis: varied, changing in form or color, from Latin mutabilis, "changeable," from mutare "to change."

mu'tans: changing, variable, mutant, from mutatus, "change, alteration.

mu'tica/mu'ticum: blunt, without a point, relates to mutilus, "cut off."

multifi'da: many times divided.

mu'tilum: divided as though torn, cut off, said of some leaves, from Latin mutilus, "mutilated."

Myoso'tis: from the Greek myos, "mouse," and ous or otos, "ear," from the shape of the leaves. The genus Myosotis was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 and is called forget-me-not and scorpion-grass.

Myoso'ton: from Greek myos, "mouse," and otos, "ear," alluding to the leaves. This was Dioscorides' name for mouse-ear. The genus Myosoton was published by Conrad Moench in 1794 and has been called water chickweed.

myosuro'ides: resembling genus Myosurus.

Myosu'rus: from the Greek mys or myos, "mouse," and oura, "tail," for the mousetail-like appearance of the receptacle in fruit. The genus Myosurus was published in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus and is called mousetail.

My'rica: derived from the Greek word myrike or murike for tamarisk, and a plant whose fruit has a greasy covering that provides the aromatic tallow from which bayberry candles are made. The genus Myrica was published by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.

Myriophyl'lum: from the Greek myrios, "numberless," and phyllon, "leaf," alluding to the many divisions of the submerged leaves of these aquatic plants. The genus Myriophyllum was published in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus and is called water-milfoil.

myur'os: mouse-tailed, from the Greek mys or myos, "mouse," and oura, "tail," referring to the shape of the inflorescence.