I’m not a traditional botanist. Not in the sense that I obsess over scientific names. I’m much more of a common-name type of human. Sure, I understand the purpose of Latin binomials, but I’m far more curious about what native peoples around the world called these plants, why they gave them those names, and what medicinal or cultural uses they found for them.

Plant people are… interesting. I once worked at a nursery where the resident plant expert—we’ll call him Derf—tried to “out-scientific-name” me. I walked into his office looking for labels, and he immediately launched into reciting his favorite trees: Brachychiton rupestris, Cupressocyparis leylandii, Chilopsis linearis… Then he asked which trees I worked with at my old nursery. I had a job to get back to, and zero interest in his unprompted plant-naming competition, so I just said, “Oaks. A bunch of oaks. And Toyon.” His smile fell. I walked out. Don’t feel too bad for Derf—most of our interactions were horrendous anyway.

If you ever want an interesting read, look up George Forrest—a Scottish plant collector often credited with “discovering” thousands of specimens in China [link]. In reality, he hired a local team of Naxi people who were basically playing real-life Animal Crossing for him while he stayed comfortable back in England eating scones or whatever. Even when their names were attached to the specimens, he threw them away. That’s how much credit he thought they deserved.

And don’t even get me started on Carl Linnaeus—this pompous Swedish botanist who gets all the glory for inventing Latin binomial nomenclature. He literally saw himself as a Newton or Galileo [link]. Sure, Jan. To this day, botanists fight over names, reshuffling plants into new genera every few years: “Well, evolutionarily, it makes more sense to put it here. Yesterday we called it this, but today it’s that. Somebody send out an email about it.”

Look—I’m not here to villainize historical figures. I’m here to shine a light on the facts. For centuries, European scientists and explorers have claimed credit for knowledge and discoveries that weren’t theirs. This didn’t just happen in botany. It happened across science—plants, animals, medicine, astronomy, you name it. Entire histories and ways of knowing were disregarded or erased. So the next time you admire your favorite plant (or animal), I challenge you: look into what it meant to the Indigenous people who understood it first. You’ll often find a story far richer than just a Latin name.