David Trout quoted Iain: "people will be free then as now to use names as they feel... " and then added " For me the key phrase in that passage is "free then AS NOW..." It occurs to me that, in the U. S. at least, we are free to call anything anything we want" Because this is a gardening list, we routinely commit the sin of omitting the names of the authors of botanical names and the date of publication of such names. And because this is a gardening list, I wouldn't want it any other way. However, this little flap we're having over the name of Lilium leichtlinii is a good example of the occasionally confusing (contentious?) results of that laissez faire attitude. In a technical paper the use of authors' names and dates of publication will go a long way to preventing the confusion. In an informal setting such as this list, we're often left to guess what people mean. I am always perplexed when someone takes personally a vigorous rebuttal to something they have posted. My point of view is that it comes with the territory: there are limitations on how we can express ourselves on this list, limitations which sometimes introduce their own problems. The failure to cite authors and dates is one (but I'm certainly not advocating that we adopt that practice). Another is that italics are not available on this list. There are many name-formatting issues which I would like to discuss on this list, but I've avoided these because we can't use italics. Without italics, any such discussions would be unintelligible or very clumsy - and that would no doubt add fuel to an already potentially inflammable topic. These niceties exist and are appreciated in other, more formal venues simply because they make it easier for us to say what we mean in an efficient way; they make it easy for the reader to understand what we mean on first reading. It has always seemed to me that one of the great values of this list is that we all bring our expertise to these discussions. And since all gardening is local, it should come as no surprise that such expertise is not uniform. As for David Trout's contention that " we are free to call anything anything we want" - if that were true, there wouldn't be libel lawyers. In any case, it's a freedom to be exercised with great caution. I try hard to be up to date in my naming practices, but it's easy to fall behind. In fact, there is no fail-proof rule for the layman to follow in this regard. The editors of popular gardening magazines were tripping over themselves in the past to use the most current name changes. I'm sure this resulted in a lot of confusion and resentment among some readers. My goal, to the extent that I have one, is to match the granularity of name accuracy to the context/audience/readership. And avoiding confusion or ambiguity is more important than that. I hope I've done that in my postings to this list; and if in my enthusiasm to pursue a particular point I occasionally fail to do so in the most mannerly manner, I can only apologize and hope that readers will consider the medium in interpreting the message. By the way, David, I’ve got loads of bulbs of Lilium majoense, L. catesbaei, L. iridollae, and L. spemperviviodes - all named in the spirit of your method – if you are interested in a trade. Funny, they all look a lot like the roots of Ranunculus ficaria. Jim McKenney jimmckenney@jimmckenney.com Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, 39.03871º North, 77.09829º West, USDA zone 7 My Virtual Maryland Garden http://www.jimmckenney.com/ BLOG! http://mcwort.blogspot.com/ Webmaster Potomac Valley Chapter, NARGS Editor PVC Bulletin http://www.pvcnargs.org/ Webmaster Potomac Lily Society http://www.potomaclilysociety.org/