Talk:Oenanthe crocata

Interpretations of the name Oenanthe

At this edit I have removed the unreferenced (and I guess nonsense) comment about vapours from the plant causing intoxication, and also the referenced, but, I feel, dubious and ill-expressed, remark about what the flowers may smell like (I've never sniffed them.) It would indeed be good to find a reference to exactly what reason Linnaeus himself gave for the name. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:12, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

We have this on a website called First Nature: "The genus name Oenanthe comes from the Greek oinis meaning wine and anthos meaning flower, implying that the scent of the flower is like wine (or perhaps suggesting that the smell makes one feel giddy as if from drinking too much wine!)" (https://www.first-nature.com/flowers/oenanthe-crocata.php#:~:text=Etymology,drinking%20too%20much%20wine!). I guess maybe you're right, the smell probably wouldn't make you giddy, but possibly harvesting it and getting covered in the sap would do so, so "nonsense" is perhaps a bit strong. This is the quote from the paper referenced: "The name Oenanthe signifies “wine flower”, because the plant produces a state of stupefaction similar to drunkenness." It makes sense to contradict the commonly-stated opinion (on various websites) that it smells like wine. How would you like to word this better? E Wusk (talk) 19:40, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. I'd like to find out, from reliable sources (not First Nature, sorry, it looks like a great site but isn't reliable for Wikipedia) why Linnaeus himself used the name. Do you have access to Species Plantarum or anything else on the subject by Linnaeus? I don't find anything in Genera Plantarum relevant to either the scent or to the derivation of the name. We seem to have two modern and perhaps fanciful alternatives, which I wouldn't personally think worth mentioning here. I'd also like to see RS who have sniffed the flowers in person, because I suspect that their scent may be attributed from the name. Richard Keatinge (talk) 22:03, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

You're setting quite a high bar for inclusion in Wikipedia... that we can't say why a plant has been given a name unless the author of that name explained it. Authors almost never explain the names they give - that's not a requirement of the Code. I think it is reasonable (and interesting to the reader) to find an explanation in a published source and report that. For example, William Leighton (Flora of Shropshire, 1841) writes: "name... in allusion to the vinous odour of the blossoms." This is different to the explanation given by Appendino, who says it is the intoxication. As it happens, the flowers don't smell of wine, so I think Appendino's explanation is the better one, but I'd be happy to report both. E Wusk (talk) 07:56, 23 July 2023 (UTC)\

A high bar for inclusion in Wikipedia's voice, as is right. Thanks again. In view of the sources that you report, I think it reasonable to say something along the lines of "Linnaeus's scientific name, "Oenanthe," comes from the Greek οίνος, "wine" and άνθος, "flower"; Linnaeus did not explain why he used this name, but various speculations for its basis include "in allusion to the vinous odour of the blossoms" (the flowers of Oenanthe crocata have no scent), or because consumption of small quantities is literally, intoxicating and this state of intoxication may be supposed to resemble drunkenness."

I suppose we could go on similarly to the further flight of fancy that the vapours from the plant can cause intoxication, and if there are enough mentions of this (evidence-free balderdash) we could do so. But we should not confuse biological reality (which I take to be the main purpose of this article) with the results of fanciful speculation by amateur classicists, however entertaining this may be. Richard Keatinge (talk) 09:27, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

You could write that. It does seem a bit laborious, to be honest. Incidentally, it wasn't Linnaeus who came up with the name, but Peter Artedi, and he probably just recycled an earlier one - we'd have to research it in all the old herbals. If you want to quibble about such details, it could be a very long explanation. (As for the balderdash, have you ever come across the headache tree or the cashew? Plant fumes can be quite powerful. It may be speculation, but I'm not sure it's entirely unreasonable.) Do you want to have a stab at this, or shall I? E Wusk (talk) 10:46, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Feel free... but it remains true that we should, indeed must, very clearly distinguish fact from fanciful speculation. Even from speculation that seems plausible to us. It's really not helpful to spread scare stories, and it's not what Wikipedia is for. Richard Keatinge (talk) 11:02, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

At this edit I have inserted a slightly-shortened version of the above. I look forward to your thoughts. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:38, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Great, thanks. I have made a small edit to add the reference for the scent comment. And I took the liberty of removing the bit about the flowers having no scent, which I'm not sure about. I asked a bunch of students to smell the flowers once and they all agreed that it doesn't smell of wine, but that's not quite the same as scentless. If we can find a reference for this, we could add it back in. (And I agree, it would be a good place to say something about how the flowers don't smell of wine, but we do need a ref.) E Wusk (talk) 17:52, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Indeed we do need a reference; good call. Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:55, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

My only other concern is that you've said that consumption of small quantities is intoxicating, but that's not in any of the references cited. If you read accounts of poisoning by hemlock water-dropwort, there's no suggestion that the poisoned people experience drunkenness. Their either die quietly in their bedrooms or they crawl in agony to the nearest house and call for a doctor. So we're now back into the realm of speculation... E Wusk (talk) 17:58, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Again, good call on leaving this bit under "speculation". Oenanthotoxin is a toxin, the hint is in the name, and so is alcohol. Indeed one might need a good imagination to confuse oenanthotoxin intoxication with most features of alcoholic excess, but at least there's some sort of basis in consensus reality. Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:55, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Thirdly, your last comment has made me finally realise what it is you didn't like about the article. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you are of the opinion that saying the scent from the flowers might cause intoxication would scare people. I see what you are thinking. But I doubt that the people who say this think that merely walking past a plant would cause drunkenness. I suspect that what they were thinking is that gathering loads of the plant and maybe slicing up the roots until you got lots of the yellow toxic oil on you would do that. Which seems quite possible but, as you say, unproven. E Wusk (talk) 18:33, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

More a case of not liking blather presented as fact. But indeed, a story with no factual basis that might scare people is unhelpful anywhere and inexcusable on Wikipedia. Thanks for your help. Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:55, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Hi Richard. Still thinking about this subject, and why people have said that the fumes can cause giddiness, I've found two reputable sources that suggest even light contact with the sap and/or fumes can do this. I've added them to the toxicity section. (Am struggling with the new editor, though, so it's taken several attempts.) What do we think? If the fumes really can be intoxicating, it's worth having that in the article. E Wusk (talk) 09:00, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks again, as you've written this it's excellent, a credit to Wikipedia. The anecdotes are valid in themselves but of limited use as evidence of a general problem - one person feeling giddy (not a pathognomonic symptom) is far from a full toxicological study of whatever effluvia the plant may give off. I guess this is one example of many occasions in which a single anecdote has been inflated in successive works. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:50, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

It is very kind of you to say so; and what you say about toxicological studies is undoubtedly true when it comes to the question of whether oenanthotoxin is really that powerful as a vapour... but that wasn't the claim. The original statement was to the effect that the name "wine flower" might be an illusion to the flowers being (believed to be) intoxicating. Flora Scotica was published long before Species Plantarum and both Artedi and Linnaeus would surely have had a copy. If they believed this (whether actually true or not) then that might well be why the curious name was assigned. Yes, that's only speculation, but people have speculated it, and it is as good an explanation of the name as any. I wonder if it still needs to go in, in some appropriate form (especially given that so many websites say it... and they didn't get it from us). With caveats, of course. I'll do some more digging. E Wusk (talk) 18:07, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Go for it! Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:44, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

OK, digging done. I've found the name Oenanthe used in Dioscorides (c. 50 AD) for two different plants, one of which happens to be an umbellifer. It seems that the name was later misapplied to northern European plants by the medieval herbalists and, by the 18th century, had come to be used for what is now the genus Oenanthe. All Linneaus/Artedi did was shorten the long form to the binomial we use now. So it turns out that "wine flower" means nothing at all when applied to the water-dropworts - it's the name of a different plant.

(Incidentally, I must correct my previous mistake - Flora Scotica was published after Species Plantarum.) E Wusk (talk) 08:24, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Nice work! It will be good to have a well-referenced account of the - I'm not quite sure what to call them - myths? fables? just-so stories? pseudoscience? Anyway, stories invented to justify names. Entirely separate from the reality. Richard Keatinge (talk) 09:38, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

OK, I've taken a stab at that in the article on the genus Oenanthe (plant), which seems the appropriate place for it. E Wusk (talk) 13:57, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

References