Names: and their meaning, book for the curious by Leopold Wagner

Names: and their meaning; a book for the curious by Leopold Wagner. - (1897). - 344 pages

NOT the least difficult matter in connection with the present work has been the choice of a title. The one finally determined upon is far from satisfactory, because it scarcely suggests the scope of the subject treated.

True enough, the single word Nomenclature offered itself as a suitable title ; but this is really a French word, derived, of course, from the Latin, and although it has been admitted into our vocabulary simply owing to the lack of an English equivalent its use is properly restricted to the classification of technical terms in relation to a particular branch of science. In a scientific sense, then, the word Nomenclature finds a ready acceptance ; but for the classification of the names of persons, of places, and of things, it is altogether too pedantic.

A young friend of the author the other day, on being informed, in answer to his inquiry, that this work would probably be entitled " The Curiosities of Nomenclature," promptly asked whether it might not be as well to explain, first of all, what the word Nomenclature meant.

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