Page:Bergey's manual of determinative bacteriology.djvu/49

. Before a Latin name of a taxon is formed, the Greek word needs to be spelled with Latin letters, and the whole word placed, when possible, in the corresponding Latin declension with appropriate gender ending. How can the Greek derivations be indicated without confusion to the student who knows little or nothing of Greek? In this the following procedure has been adopted as standard and as probably the most readily understood. The student must remember that the change is from Greek to Latin (not to English) orthography. The system used here is not that usually found in giving derivations in medical or general English dictionaries. Some illustrations may be helpful.

The Greek word for sulfur is. The first letter, theta, has no Latin equivalent; the Latins used th. The second letter, epsilon, is the equivalent of short e in Latin. The third letter, iota, is equivalent to i, the fourth, omicron , is short o, and the last, nu , is n. One may transliterate as theion. But the of the Greek, a diphthong, was transliterated by the Latins as a long i. The ending of the Greek indicates that the noun is neuter. The corresponding neuter ending in Latin is um. In final form we may write = theion = thium. In the the statement given is simply Gr. neut. n. (Greek neuter noun) thium sulfur. Thi is the stem from which a great number of new Latin names of taxa have been constructed, as Thioploca, Thioderma, Thiocystis.

Some awkward transliterations are to be found in the literature. The Greek diphthong = ai was usually transliterated as ae by the Latins. The Greek = haima = haema. Haemophilus is correctly spelled; Hemophilus is not a "simplified spelling" but an incorrectly spelled modern Latin word.

One finds many errors of transliteration in bacteriological nomenclature. If corrected, the words should be regarded as alternative spellings (variants) of the same word and not as two different words.

Sometimes there are incongruities in transliteration of Greek into Latin form in a single word. For example, the specific epithet of the species Micrococcus lysodeikticus is an interesting mixture. The second component of the word is the Greek. The first letter, delta, is d; the second, epsilon , is short e; the third (and sixth), iota , is short i; the fourth (and seventh) is kappa , the Latin c; the eighth, omicron , is short o; and the final, sigma , is s. The Latins used i for the diphthong. There is no k in the Latin alphabet. The masculine ending os in Greek becomes us in Latin. Hence, = deicticos = dicticus. Correct transliteration would have given lysodicticus instead of the current lysodeikticus.

However, in general, it is well to observe the rule that the original spelling of the word be conserved, unless it can be regarded definitely as a slip of the pen.

A few generic names have been so commonly incorrectly accented as to constitute accepted exceptions. Several examples may be cited.

Many generic names in bacteriology and protozoology have as the final component -monas, as Pseudomonas and Xanthomonas. The Greek word is. The first vowel is short. Correct accentuation would give Pseu.do′mo.nas, Xan.tho′mo.nas, etc. with the accent on the antepenult. There is a tendency to regard the o as long and to place the accent on the penult, giving Pseu.do.mo′nas, the pronunciation accepted by such dictionaries as Century and Dorland.