Buddleja, or Buddleia (also historically given as Buddlea), commonly known as the butterfly bush, is a genus comprising over 100 species of flowering plants endemic to Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The generic name bestowed by Linnaeus posthumously honoured the Reverend Adam Buddle (1662–1715), a botanist and rector in Essex, England, at the suggestion of Dr. William Houstoun. Houstoun sent the first plants to become known to science as Buddleja (B. americana) to England from the Caribbean about 15 years after Buddle’s death. (From Wikipedia)
Nomenclature
The botanic name has been the source of some confusion. By modern practice of botanical Latin, the spelling of a generic name made from ‘Buddle’ would be Buddleia, but Linnaeus in his Species Plantarum of 1753 and 1754 spelled it Buddleja, with the long i between two vowels.
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