Galanthus description as "Viola alba" or "Viola bulbosa" using Pliny's translation, and comments that the plant had originated in Italy and had "taken possession" in England "many years past". The genus was formally named "Galanthus" and described by Carl Linnaeus in 1753, with the single species, "Galanthus nivalis", which is the type species. Consequently, Linnaeus is granted the botanical authority. In doing so, he distinguished this genus and species from "Leucojum" ("Leucojum bulbosum trifolium minus"), a name by which it had been previously known. In 1763 Adanson began a system of arranging genera in families. Using the synonym "Acrocorion" (also spelt
Galanthus nivalis (flowering stalk), which bears at the top a pair of bract-like spathe valves joined by a papery membrane. From between them emerges a solitary, pendulous, bell-shaped white flower, held on a slender pedicel. The flower consists of six tepals, also referred to as segments. The outer three are larger and more convex than the inner ones. The inner flower segments are usually marked on their outer surface with a green or greenish-yellow V- or U-shaped mark (sometimes described as "bridge-shaped") over the small sinus (notch) at the tip of each tepal. The inner surface has a faint green mark covering