In the thread "ID requested on scarlet lawn weed", we got off topic onto nomenclature. In response to Richard Wright's comment:

"My chief amateur's hate is the introduction of the rule that a family must have a genus with the name that produces the name of the family - Hence long entrenched family names Umbilliferae and Brassicaceae were thrown out of the window."

PvR stated:

"Actually there is no such rule: it is perfectly within the rules to use Umbelliferae. It has become somewhat nfashionable, but any complaints should be directed against the writers of flora's and textbooks, not against the rules.

"The confusion you note is probably worse at the level of order and above"

Of course people can use whatever terms they like, but rationale of Linnaen nomenclature is standardisation, so as reduce confusion. Unfortunately over the centuries inconsisitencies have accumulated, giving rise to an international forum (International Committee for the Nomenclature of Cultivated Plants?) charged with sorting this out. Whatever one thinks of the results, serious botanical authors (of Flora or whatever), have to use the current generallly agreed nomenclature, within whatever system is being used (Cronquist, APG etc). So surely "Umbilliferae", for instance, is no longer an option. It is not the authors' fault, but the makers of the rules.

I sympathise with Richard, having grown up with descriptive family names - Umbrella or Crucifer are more descriptive of what the species look like, than the type genus criteria now in use. My favourite was "Papiloniaceae" - "Fabaceae" does nothing for me.

Peter