Science editors and authors of manuscripts and textbooks are encouraged to replace eponyms with more relevant nomenclature despite descriptive and historical custom which may extend back centuries. The pinnacle of academic recognition and fame in the life sciences must surely be to have a body part, organ, disease or technique named after the discoverer. We all know the Organ of Corti, though probably few contemporary scientists or students, apart from those with historical interest, know anything about Corti, or even when or where he made his discoveries. Human anatomy has probably the largest collection of eponyms in the medical sciences and the eponymous structures commonly have highly descriptive and mellifluous tags such as Fallopian tubes, Islets of Langerhans, Schmidt-Lan-termann clefts or Wharton's jelly. The learned academic societies, in particular those associated with anatomy and embryology, have spent considerable time and energy with nomenclature committees encouraging the disuse of eponyms and their replacement in textbooks and scientific publications with more disciplined and accurate terminology. However, long-time use of eponyms, sometimes extending over centuries, has firmly embedded eponyms in the textbooks and popular press and it may prove a losing battle to try and replace them. In fact some eponyms can claim origins dating back to classical times, though these are usually based on associations rather than their discoverers. Achilles tendon is. a pertinent example. The popular press still refers to Adam's apple, and Caesarean operations.
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