Responding to a recent article about the llama and alpaca, a friend wrote
in that the names are listed in Webster’s 1828 dictionary, which led to the
following response about the American camelids.
In the Index generum mammalium (U.S.
Department of Agriculture, Government Printing Office, 1904), which is a
984-page list of the genera and families of mammals, by Theodore Sherman
Palmer, the first mention of what we now call the Llama is given by Frisch in 1775, in which he refers to the
American camelid as “Das Amerikansche Kameel.” However, this list was not begun
until 1884, according to the preface dated 1902, by C. Hart Merriam, Chief of Division
of Biological Survey, under whose direction the Index was prepared.
Many names within the list, “which now pass current were refused
recognition by some of the older zoologists,” specifically “based on certain
principles of nomenclature laid down by Carl Linnaeus (Carl von Linní) in 1751 in Sweden in his Philosophia Botanica” as well as by H.
B. C. Illiger. And more than 3,000 names were provided by the Zoological
Society of London from works not available in the United States. In addition,
many names came from Queensland Museum in Brisbane, the Natural History Museum
in London, the British Museum, and also from sources in Berlin and Paris.
In addition, such works as (left) Sir David Brewster’s Edinburg Encyclopedia, which was printed
in the U.S. in 1832. Brewster, who was a prominent figure in the popularization
of science, also was the editor of the 18-volume Edinburg Encyclopedia, which was published in competition with the Encyclopedia Britannica, in which
Brewster wrote most of the articles. By the time the Encyclopedia Britannica made its way to America, a former Edinburgh
resident, Thomas Dobson, was in the U.S. and took offense at the slanted British
history in the Britannica.
The 18-volume third edition of the Encyclopedia
Britannica, was first started in 1788 and actually finished in 1797, which was
then pirated by Dobson, who dropped the
term Britannica from the title, the dedication to King George III was
replaced with a dedication to the readers, and sundry facts about American
history, geography and peoples were added, as well as an out-of-date map of
North America corrected. Dobson printed the work in the U.S. in 1798 (title page left), and the first two sets were
immediately purchased by George Washington, and also Thomas Jefferson, Aaron
Burr and Alexander Hamilton obtained copies. The first 2000 copies were sold out by 1818. By
1829, after Dobson’s death, the work was superseded by the first edition of Encyclopedia Americana (1819-1833).
Left: The Zoological
Society Proceedings, including Illustrations, was printed in London, Paris and
Leipzig, Germany—first published in 1831; Right: The Natural History Museum
(British Museum (Natural History before 1992), London, was established in 1881
All of this is meant to show that what might have been common in Europe
in the early 1800s, in such areas as the Proceedings of the Zoological Society
in London, later in the Proceedings of the Royal Society (London), or in the
Natural History Museum or other such areas in Europe, was not known in the
U.S., especially outside scientific biological circles, and even more
especially in a back area where Joseph Smith lived and translated the plates
into the Book of Mormon.
As an example, the first mention of the animal classification Lama paca, more accurately listed
scientifically as L. paca, though classified as early as 1775 in Europe, did
not appear in print until 1831 in Europe (London), and 1904 in the United
States. And the classification in 1775 was “Das
Amerikansche Kameel” the Camelus
lacma Cuvier; although Carl Linnaeus in 1758 had named it "Camelus peruvianus Glama
dictus" (llama) and Camelus pacos "Camelus
peruvianus laniger Pacos dictus" (alpaca), placing them together in a
single genus with the Old World dromedary and bactrian camels, Camelus dromedarius and Camelus bactrianus. Tiedem
listed it under Lama in 1808, and
Abhand as llacma in 1811; Griff as Auchenia huanaca in 1827; Gray as Llama guanacus in 1872; and Thomas
listed it as Lama glama in 1891, as
well as Lama pacos; and lama vicugna.
The two remaining New World
species, the wild guanaco and vicuña, were subsequently designated Camelus guanicoe by Miller in 1776
and Camelus vicuña by Molina
in 1782. As early as 1775, Frisch proposed that the four New World
species be placed in the genus Lama,
but this work was not accepted by the International Commission on Zoological
Nomenclature and authorship of Lama
was credited to Cuvier in 1800.
Some claim that the first mention of llamas
is in Voltair’s Candide; however, he writes
in French about “red sheep,” which a commentator wrote in the footnotes that he
believes that Voltaire actually meant llamas,
since part of the story takes place in Argentina, South America (and also in
fictional El Dorado). However, if Voltaire, who wrote Candide in Switzerland
thought of llamas, it would be
interesting in 1758 how he came across that knowledge. In fact, so unknown were
the llamas in 1918, that the writer of the footnote had to explain what a llama was, and explain that it was not a
draft animal as Voltaire described his red sheep (though llamas carry loads, they are limited to ¼ of their weight, i.e., a
400 pound lama will carry 100 pounds, and if you load him more than that, they
refuse to move; yet, even so, Voltair’s work was written in 1759 and published
in Geneva, Amsterdam, London and Paris, but the comment not added until 1918.
Going even further, it is well known that “there
were no camelids in North America until the importation of llamas as zoo
exhibits into the United States in the late 1800s—long after Joseph Smith’s
time. Even then, the number of imports were small and generally included
guanacos or guanaco hybrids. Alpaca and vicuña importations were negligible,
and any traces of these species in the United States at that time were thought to have
arrived via hybrids.
While
the first llamas were introduced into Australia in 1865, but made no headway
and the entire herd died out, the Bronx Zoo is credited with having one of the
earliest llamas in the U.S., but the zoo didn’t open until November 8, 1899.
Probably, the most significant importations was made in the early 1900s by William
Randolph Hearst to populate his San Simeon estate with these animals as well as
a number of species, such as lions, bears, gazelles, zebras, and other exotic
animals.
J. Randolph Heart’s “castle” at San Simeon in central California
Reported
to have numbered twelve animals, Hearst's importation is thought to have been
the largest to that date. In 1930, importation was cut off by a "Foot and
Mouth Disease" embargo on all South American hoofed stock. Thereafter, the
only stock legally entering the United States came from Canada where the llama
population was equally limited. Some unauthorized entries reportedly took place
after 1930 but again were small.
As
for the Alpaca, they were not
imported into the United States until 1983. And as for names, the name Llama was not known in 1830 to either
the public or Noah Webster, as shown through its not being listed in his 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language,
under its Spanish (llama) or local Quechua (llama) name. In fact, lama is more
appropriately referred to scientifically as L. glama, for Lama glama—listed in Webster’s 1828 dictionary under “lama,” with its main definition as “The sovereign pontiff, or rather the god of the Asiatic Tartars.” Thus, the animal, known today
as llama, was listed as a secondary meaning of less import in 1828 than a god
of the Asian (Crimean) Tartars.
And the name “alpaca” is not only missing from the
1828 dictionary, under either the Spanish (alpaca) or the local Aymara
(allpaca), it is also not found under either of its scientific names, Vicugna pacos, or either of its breeds: Suri alpaca or Huacaya alpaca. It is, however, found under alpagna, with the correct spelling used as Alpag’na, a name unknown today and unassociated with any animal,
though “alpagna,” is shown for “an animal of Peru, used as a beast of burden;
the Camelus Paco of Linne, and the Pacos of Pennant.” (Pa’co is also found,
with the definition “an animal of South America,
resembling the camel in shape, but much smaller. It is sometimes called the
Peruvian sheep, on account of its long thick hair.”
It is interesting that there is no etymology for either Alpagna or
Alpag’na—words or names unknown outside Webster’s 1828 dictionary, and where or how he came by them is unknown.
In fact, as late as 2001, the
scientific world thought the “alpaca” was descended from the “llama” however, DNA shows that it is classified,
where it is now listed, as part of (descended from) the Vicugna (vicuña).
Left the Vicuna;
Right: the Alapaca
Consequently, there seems good
cause for the Spirit to have acknowledged Joseph Smith’s use of the original
Jaredite or Nephite name for these two animals—cureloms and cumoms to avoid all
of these early disputes and difficulty with their names that continued for
nearly a hundred years after Joseph’s time.
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Is this new information? I do not recall all of this in your previous posts on these animals.
ReplyDeleteNo. It is just more technical than we usually post. Sometimes in order to condense information into a posting article, we leave out the more technical data; however, in doing do, it sometimes elicits comments that otherwise would have been answered. The data on this in Webster's 1828 dictionary was never clarified by us to the point it is here, but it caused a reader some questions so we are answering it here.
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