Arboretum Bulletin Summer 2019, Volume 81, Issue 2 | Page 21

Q&A from the Miller Library’s Plant Answer Line WHAT’S IN A NAME? Plant Common Names and the Stories They Tell B y R e b e cc a A l e x a n d e r This regular column features Q&A selected and adapted from the Elisabeth C. Miller Library’s Plant Answer Line program. If you’d like to ask a plant or gardening question of your own, please call [phone] (UW Plant), send it via the library website (www.millerlibrary.org), or email directly to [email protected]. I n the realm of botany and horticulture, scientific plant names are often held in higher esteem than vernacular names, since they afford greater clarity and precision (usually). Common names seem anarchic, and confusion arises when one name refers to a smattering of different and unrelated plants or one plant goes by multiple names with regional variations. However, the roots of common names reach deep, and what we have called a plant over time can reveal a great deal about human-plant rela- tionships throughout history. These names can be evocative, colorful, descriptive or puzzling. They may shift linguistically, reflecting our own exiles and migrations, our explorations and conquests, and our cultural norms. Common names can be bawdy, or even deeply offen- sive. This article will explore a selection of plant names that the Miller Library staff have researched in the course of answering questions over the years. Schoenoplectus acutus. (Photo © Jerry Oldenettel) INDIGENOUS NAMES AND LINGUISTIC SHAPE-SHIFTING Where does the expression “the toolies”—also spelled “tules”—originate? The tules is a famil- iar term in California for what people in other regions call “the boondocks” or “the sticks,” meaning the wild outskirts, but it actually comes from a plant name. In Northern California, tule refers to two species of bulrush, Schoenoplectus acutus and Schoenoplectus californicus (both formerly in the genus Scirpus). A deeper look at the roots of the name reveals that it is borrowed from the Spanish tule, which itself was a colonial era borrowing of tollin or tullin, the Nahuatl word for various types of reeds and bulrushes. Summer 2019 v 19