Tom, Olivier, et al.,

Ah. I thought that Clithon might be derived from someone's name, and it
could easily be derived from Clithos by a simple change of gender from
masculine -os to neuter -on. Y is different from I in Greek (Y is pronounced
like German UE or French U, and is often transliterated as U), so Clithon
probably does not come from the island Klythos.

Who named Clithon, please? I ask because Linnaeus, who had to invent
thousands of new names, often memorialized the names of Greek gods,
demigods, and men of note. As an aid to memory, he gave all the members of
one family of butterflies the names of heroes from Homer's Iliad. It may
seem a bit odd at first to lend the names of warriors to lepidopterans, but
it shows a subtle sense of humor: The Greeks believed that butterflies were
the souls of the dead; they had one word (psyche) for both.

So the next question is, what are the names of related genera that were
erected by the author of Clithon? Are they, too, named for Alexander's
generals? Parmenius, Seleucius, Antigonus, Hephaistion, Kraterios, Lysander,
and Ptolemy come to mind immediately of course.

Incidentally, I've never seen any other evidence of Linnaeus having a
particularly subtle form of humor. Some of his choices of names for
invertebrates are earthy (bivalve Venus and polychaete Aphrodita being the
most obvious, but hardly the only, examples). He must have been fun to be
around. His students adored him.

Andrew K. Rindsberg
Geological Survey of Alabama


-----Original Message-----
From: Conchologists of America List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Thomas E. Eichhorst
Sent: Thursday, October 07, 2004 8:35 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: happy tetrapilocomist


Olivier,

I have found translation sites for Greek, but none seem all that useful.  I
have also found Clithos, a general under Alexander, and Klythos, a beach on
the Greek Island of Naxos.  Neither very useful.  Clithon remains a mystery.

Tom E.

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