4 replies to this topic

[LC3]

Hello everyone! I have a few random  questions. 

How are ants named e.g Myrmica rubra. I found that lots of ant genuses end in rmex,cine,mica,tus,sius. Do these mean anything in Greek or Latin? If you know anything about these things please reply. 

 

And herreres the question.

What's your favourite subfamily of ants? I'm only familiar with three subfamilies so I'm not listing anything down (at the moment).

 

Have a nice day.

 

 

 

 

[cpman]

The genera that end in -myrmex have that because if I remember right, myrmex is Greek for ant. All the variations on that, like ones that start with myrm- are due to the same reason.
A lot of the other endings are just standard Latin endings.

My favorite large subfamily is probably Myrmicinae, as there is an insane amount of diversity in that subfamily -- from Atta to Pheidole to Crematogaster.

My favorite small subfamily is Pseudomyrmecinae as they look awesome and the relationships of some of the tropical species with their host plats is awesome.

[James C. Trager]

Usually, ant names are base on words from another language, usually Greek or Latin, but often others, and the names are intended have a meaning. Myrmica, -idris, -myrmex, etc are various ways of saying ant in Greek, while Formica means ant in Latin. Species names such as rubra, longispinosus, etc. describe characteristics, in these cases red color and long spines. The has been an unfortunate trend recently by some ant taxonomists to coin names that are simply combinations of of letters that look like Greek or Latin but are actually nonsense words. I find these harder to remember than names with meaning, but I suppose for most people, who do't know any Latin or Greek it doesn't matter much. 
 

The endings "rmex,cine,mica,tus,sius" you cite do not have meaning themselves. They are mostly grammatical endings, but in these you have also "stolen" a letter form the root word and put it on the front end of the grammatical ending, like asking what do the -ding of ending, or the -len of stolen mean?

[LC3]

Oops sorry.

[Trailandstreet]

Usually, ant names are base on words from another language, usually Greek or Latin, but often others, and the names are intended have a meaning. Myrmica, -idris, -myrmex, etc are various ways of saying ant in Greek, while Formica means ant in Latin. Species names such as rubra, longispinosus, etc. describe characteristics, in these cases red color and long spines. The has been an unfortunate trend recently by some ant taxonomists to coin names that are simply combinations of of letters that look like Greek or Latin but are actually nonsense words. I find these harder to remember than names with meaning, but I suppose for most people, who do't know any Latin or Greek it doesn't matter much. 
 

The endings "rmex,cine,mica,tus,sius" you cite do not have meaning themselves. They are mostly grammatical endings, but in these you have also "stolen" a letter form the root word and put it on the front end of the grammatical ending, like asking what do the -ding of ending, or the -len of stolen mean?

Now you have made me a little bit curious about the names with the "combination of letters that look like greek or latin". From my former aquaristic time I only remember names with meanings.