In 1939, Philip Earle Glover was appointed Chief Pasture Officer for Somaliland. With encouragement from Abdillah Arr, the chief interpreter for the Department of Agriculture and Veterinary Science, Glover compiled a checklist of Somali plant names alongside their scientific equivalents. This list, drawn from work by him and other colonial officers, was published in 1947.
In 2022, Helen Pickering began updating Glover’s checklist. She incorporated Somali names from the Flora of Somalia (four volumes) and updated the scientific names using Plants of the World Online (as of May 2024). Her updated version of Glover's checklist, titled Glover – Linking Local and Scientific Knowledge, was published in July 2025.
The published version has two parts:
- English part: Introduction in English, plant names sorted by scientific name, the table of other words sorted by the English words.
- Somali part: Introduction in Somali, plant names sorted by Somali name, and the table of other words sorted by the Somali words.
Only a few copies have been published BUT Helen asked SBF to give free access to PDFs for the two parts via its website. We are happy to do so, in both A4 and ltr formats. Having two separate parts will reduce download times and allow users to choose whether they want both parts. In addition, the table below allows selecting the four sections of each separately, again in both A4 and ltr formats. An interactive online version of the dictionary will be developed soon.
The Somaliland Biodiversity Foundation thanks Helen Pickering for giving such free access to her publication on this website.
