At 11:38 AM -0500 11/26/1997, PAGODROMA at aol.com wrote:
>So, which is it? I'm surprised no one has posted the the definitive answer
>yet. Perhaps the correct usage as evaded the careful eye of editors in
>various esteemed journals.

One of the three is unequivocally wrong, and for the other two, it's a
matter of taste (or, if you bow to authority, of whatever happens to be AOU
policy).

John Xntus (there should be an acute accent on the "a") is a person, and
the bird is named after him; therefore his name should be in proper form
for a possessive adjective; therefore "Xantus" without apostrophe is
unacceptable. Barbaric, in fact.

So, how do you form the possessive in this case? Most of us over a certain
age learned in school that the possessive of singular words ending in "s"
could be written either with or without an additional "s" following the
apostrophe, at the writer's option. So, either "Xantus'" or "Xantus's"
would be acceptable. Beyond that, the only guideline is that you should be
consistent. Publishers always make a decision on this and incorporate it
into their manuals of "house style" for authors and editors. Some opt for
one way, some for the other. (That was also the case, as I recall, among
my junior-high and high-school teachers.)

The AOU, up until last July, opted for the "no-extra-s" solution. So you
will find this species listed in their publications as Xantus' Hummingbird.
However, in the latest check-list supplement in Auk (July 1997), they
announced that they would do it the other way from now on. So it would be
Xantus's Hummingbird.

This creates a real dilemma for editors. Let's say your publication has a
"no s" policy, but also has a policy of following AOU for all nomenclatural
matters. This would means that (for example) you would be obliged to let
stand a glaring inconsistency such as "five Ross's Geese were seen at Ross'
Landing." Sigh.

I think we would be better off if AOU let go of this one and allowed that
the formation of the possessive was an editorial, not a scientific,
decision, that each publisher or individual was free to make.

Another interesting aspect of this comes out if you ask yourself why the
alternative possessive came into being in the first place. Although there
may be more than one historical explanation, the clearest one is that the
additional "s" is an attempt to reflect the way these endings are actually
pronounced. But such usage is inconsistent. For example, most of use
would pronounce the possessive of the goose named for Ross as "Rosses
Goose," and clearly the form "Ross's Goose" is an attempt to make it look
the way it sounds. But then, what about "Xantus's Hummingbird?" Has
anyone ever heard it pronounced like "Zantoozes?" I think we all say just
plain "Zantooze." So, if the "rule" depended on phonetic logic, this one
should be "Xantus'." Then we have the case of words that end in letters
other than "s" but that are pronounced like an "s." What do you do with
Vaux's Swift? The "correct" pronunciation is said to be "Vawkses," in
which case, "Vaux's" is the phonetically sensible spelling. But if you are
a Revolutionary American and prefer French pronunciations to the British
(it's an American bird, isn't it?), then you'll be calling it "Voze" and
would surely want to see it written "Vaux'."

Maybe the length of this reply will help explain who nobody answered you
earlier, Richard. All that explanation and no certainty. Guess we'll have
to live with it... or just let your editor decide.

Hal Opperman - Medina, WA - (425) 635-0503
"The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he
complains of my gab and my loitering."
Walt Whitman