Hoc est verum et nihili nisi verum.

Very interesting - I'm no Linnaeus, but I enjoyed reading that and look forward to learning more about the Latin meaning of plant names. I strive to learn the scientific names, and attempt a reasonable pronunciation!

I love Maianthemum canadense, it's a lovely little native woodland groundcover. There's a patch growing under some Pines in my yard.

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Actually, that is not why it is called "canadense". First, this whole part of the world was not called Canada at any point, including the time of Linnaeus.

Second, the specific epithet (the species name) was given because that is where the type specimen came from. In other words, the first plant sent by a botanist to European authorities such as Linnaeus, and based upon which the species name was given, came from Canada, or what was then Canada, even tho it is native to places other than Canada.

You often see the specific epithet "virginiana". The type specimens for such species came from what was then Virginia but could well be native to areas north, south or west of Virginia then or now. It's just that the original plant, named for scientific purposes, was found in then-Virginia. Or Canada, as in the case of the plant under discussion here.

And I am surprised yours keeps its leaves thru the growing season. I have carpets of these--planted by Mother Nature--but they always die back in the heat of summer.

Oh, no, Mr. Bill. Now I feel totally compromised! I HATE passing along faulty info. Ginny, please do not get defensive, but would you plse tell me how you know this part of the world was never called Canada? The fellow who runs that nursery seems a scholar like yourself, so now, like the grandfather in Moonstruck, "I am confused"! I can spend hours researching this fact but I thought i'd just ask you directly.
Thanks much,
Mindy

Hey, I have this in my "lawn" and never knew what it was! (See the thread on lawns in the NE forum - this is one of the many "unidentified weeds" I refer to).

Now I have a name for it. Mine grows profusely in the swath of haircap moss I have, in about half-day sun. I never paid attention to when the leaves died back, just figuring it was another weed. I'll have to watch out for that now.

Thanks for the photo, Terrene, and thanks for the thread Mindy.

:)
Dee

Ginny,
As Jimmy Buffet says, "mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa."
I have spent the last hour researching the 'canadense' origin, and now that I've found that out, I'm trying to figure out how I could be soooo stupid.I think what threw me in the Linnaeus-'canadense' purported 'fact', is that before about a month ago, I thought Linnaeus was a medeival scholar. So, even though the quote's writer cited the birth and death dates of Linnaeus(18th century), I was still thinking Medeival, so I was willing to believe that North America could have been called Canada in medeival times (though, now that I think of it, that was stupid thinking too.I don't know that this part of the world was known/named by Europeans before Columbus...... and America came from Americo Vespucio
the explorer,in 1503. two hundred years BEFORE Linnaeus!!!!!

so I googled "world maps 1720" and found this entry among many.

"1728.1 THE ENGLISH EMPIRE IN AMERICA BY R B, from a reprint of the 1685 edition of Nathaniel Crouch's book of the same name (McCorkle #728.1). "

wow, how stupid can I get? ah well, at least I know it now.i'll pass this along to the perpetrator. Shame on him!!
Maybe all this horticultural Latin shorts out our history sense sometimes, eh?
best,
Mindy

In the time of the fur traders, early to mid 18th century, a large part of the midwest and into the southern Mississippi valley was called "Canada"...by the fur traders.Massachusetts was never Canada, nor was Virginia nor South Carolina nor any of the Colonies. And at that time Virginia stretched far to the west.
Linneaus' samples came from what was called "Canada", but that was not all of the New World.
There are many plants with the tag Virgineansis or Carolinensis and even Missouriensis.
I am remembering a social studies class....but a simple Google search bore me out.
Linda C

Mindy - historical geography is complicated. In the early 1700s much of the south was called 'Florida' and other large chunks of North America were called New France, Canada, New Mexico, New Spain. California was depicted as an island :) Don't be too hard on Barry Glick, there is truth in what he was trying to get across - that the states didn't exist at that time but colonies owned by other nations did. The boundaries of those colonies were very different from what we know today.

Part of the Huge French territory above the Great Lakes was called Canada in the 1700's. The link below has a bunch of maps from the 1700's showing Canada on them.
Anyway, I do find the name canadense very helpful when reading about a plant. I know chances are high it will do well here.
Remy

Here is a link that might be useful: Old Maps with Canada