naming of plants

penstemon penstemon@Q.com
Sat, 09 Jan 2016 07:50:53 PST
>I never got the English upper/lower case logic - i know the rules and 
follow them sometimes, but i don't see the idea behind - or what I see, 
I don't like much. I particularly dislike to use the uppercase I (see 
above), as it seems to say " I am more important than you". And i don't 
think anything nation or language like should be capitalized even if 
it's an adjective, it feels rather nationalistic. German is clear and 
precise: Nouns and names upper case, anything else not - its a system, 
not a rating.
Nouns used to be capitalized in at least some books, as late as the 18th century. “Bob Nold, a singularly jovial Fellow, grows many Crocuses in his Garden, though he does tend to complain too much about the awful Cold, Ice, and Snow.” 
Place names, and not just those of nations, are always capitalized, for who knows what reason. “He is a Denverite.” 
Scilla is a singular noun, both in English and botanical Latin. (My Latin dictionary says “scilla” means “shrimp”; an alternative spelling is “squilla”.) 
All generic names are singular and can never be plural.  
When used to refer to anything else other than the genus, the word becomes lower case, and carries a standard English plural. 
“Rabbits ate my scillas down to the ground.”
Bob Nold
Denver, Colorado, USA
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