Call a Spade a Shovel

Once upon a time, there was only the humble rock dove (Columba Livia). And then they met mankind and they started on a long journey together--mankind and this fascinating bird. Somewhere between that fateful day and ours, someone spotted a rock dove that didn't look like a rock dove. Maybe he (or she) spotted a brown rock dove. Maybe they spotted a rock dove doing somersaults in the air.

Both brown in pigeons and the somersaulting behavior (called rolling) are very old traits and both diverge from the "standard" rock dove. The point is that this first bird that was different from the rock dove necessitated a new name. You couldn't just call it a rock dove, now could you? How would anyone know that this was a special rock dove that turns somersaults in the air or that it was a brown bird as opposed to the blue ones that were everywhere? Hence the need for breed names was born.

From what I know, I believe most of these names were a matter of practicality. The pigeon which is now referred to as the Runt in the US, was probably called a Roman Pigeon by the people of the ancient world. Calling it the "Roman Pigeon" was very practical and sort of pithy. How the name changed from "Roman Pigeon" to "Runt" is an interesting study in etymology all by itself.

But, the more interesting question would be this: did everyone call it "Roman Pigeon"? I mean, if nothing else there's the simple question of not everyone in the ancient world speaking Latin (or more likely Greek). So would the locals simply give it the name "Roman Pigeon" in their local tongue? I don't know. There's also the fact that the name "Roman Pigeon" wouldn't tell you much about the bird other than the fact that someone thinks it originated in Rome. Calling it "Big Pigeon" would have been much more descriptive and handy. In fact the various Mondain breeds of pigeons (thought to have been created from that long lost "Roman Pigeon") all share the appellation "Mondain" which means something like "earthy and large".

This is, undoubtedly, an old problem; Carl Linne (better known as Linnaeus) invented an entire system of nomenclature to address a similar problem--the problem of differing local names in differing local languages for the same plants and animals. Perhaps we pigeon fanciers need to invent Latin names for our breeds. Of course without a central authority to assign names, it's sort of pointless anyway.

A name is just a handle on a particular set of genes regardless; the truth of the matter is that with certain birds--mongrel pigeons--there's not a name to give to the breed. And as long as people want to create new breeds and push forward into new territory there will always be new names to get confused.