Animal Categorization

[demonslayerelf]

I'm working on a thing, and a part of that thing(It's a book) is a semi-archaic, fantasy-like way of separating animals into categories. The real world offers little help, as it used Aristotle's work(Which is still almost 2000 years before the general time-period-equivalent of most DnD games) until the 18th century. And the 18th century work is still very modern, so it's more than a little frustrating.

I've attempted to do something, and I'm close to throwing in the towel. The goal of this categorization stuff is to separate animals based on some general shared traits. Some genetic, physical, etc. and some behavioral. Basically, I'm trying to write a 15th or so century bestiary based on what you can observe about animals.

Here's my current work, with some explanation towards my though process, where I think it might be needed;
(Also Note: There can be smaller groups in there. I very much intended it with this work, but I didn't get that far.)

Spoiler: Work

Show

Arachnida
Spiders and Scorpions

Avia
Birds

Canina
Dogs, Wolves, Coyotes, etc.

Crustacea
All the shelled animals

Delphinida
Mammals with flippers

Digita
Mammals with opposable digits(Explanation: This isn't just the apes and monkeys. I had those, but then I couldn't find a category for things like Koalas. All of them had fingers, so they're all there.)

Dormica
Rabbits, rodents, squirrels, bats(Not fruit bats), etc.

Felina
Cats

Formicia
Insects

Lacertilla
Lizards/Crocodiles/Etc.

Magnatibia
Large/Thick Legged Mammals(Here's the explanation for this one: Elephants don't have hooves, and aren't genetically close to one of the other groups. I got stucked.)

Piscea
Fish

Sauria
Dinosaurs

Serpenta
Snakes

Ungula
Animals with Hooves

Ursa
Bears

Vulpia
Foxes and Flying Foxes(The Fruit Bats)

I'm just asking for general help here. I needs it.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

It'll have a very different flavor, but maybe try to keep it simple and everyday-y? After all, words like birds, fish, beasts and bugs have been around for a while, people have always grasped the concept of grouping animals.

So you could have something like:

Beasts
- Furry beasts
-- Predators
--- (Something about cats, wolves, bears? That last one including badgers?)
-- Leaf eaters
-- Climbers
-- Rats (included otters and beavers)
-- Livestock
- Scaly beasts (maybe find a name that includes smooth skinned reptiles and amphibians as well)
-- Snakes
-- Fourlegs
--- Lizards
--- Crocodiles
--- Longnecks
--- (Whatever other groups of dinosaurs you're using)
-- Twolegs
--- (subcategories if necessary)
Birds
- Bats
- Feathery
-- Birds of Prey
-- Song birds (Flying birds? Small birds?)
-- Park birds
and something like that for the other two as well?

I mean, it will still feel like an artificial thing, so perhaps it's just as well to take a more systema naturae approach and a wizard did it. But that would be an option. I think most of the originality/authenticity can be gotten from fitting groups together that we know aren't related, but that are at first glance kind of similar/examples of convergent evolution. So as you say koala's and "little bears" such as raccoons and coatis go with the monkeys, bats with bird, whales with fish (maybe seals and even crocodiles too?). Salamanders are grouped in with the lizards, stuff like that...

[demonslayerelf]

I mean, I like it, but it doesn't really match the idea of "General shared traits," really.

For instance, grouping bears, dogs, cats, and more into the same group almost makes the group meaningless; You won't see bears and wolves hiding and pouncing on prey, you won't see wolves or cats get on their hind legs for a heavier murder attempt, etc. The only shared traits are things like... "Has claws and fangs" and "Is a predator." And even then, bears eat a lot of not-meat things, whereas cats usually have a ridiculous percent of their diet being pure meat.

I can see bats being grouped with birds, though, in a way. And I do like the grouping of the reptiles and amphibians based on their leg-ness. I'll definitely be using some of this, thank you so much.

[Nifft]

The goal of this categorization stuff is to separate animals based on some general shared traits. Some genetic, physical, etc. and some behavioral. Basically, I'm trying to write a 15th or so century bestiary based on what you can observe about animals.

Trait ideas for non-modern-genetics categorization schemes:

Domestic vs. Trainable vs. Wild -> Can this animal be domesticated? Can it be trained? Or is it useless to our civilization?

Sun-blessed vs. Night-seeking -> Is this animal nocturnal? We all know that darkness = evil so that's probably super important.

Elemental Affiliation -> Frogs and otters and sea-snakes and jellyfish are all clearly Water-aspected, unlike toads and foxes and garter-snakes and slugs.

Fiend-shape vs. Honest -> Can a vampire control creatures of this type? Can an Imp or Quasit turn into one? If so, it's probably untrustworthy.

[demonslayerelf]

That's also kind of missing the point. The problem is, I'm not looking for an ignorant system, just an Archaic one. It works in ways, even if there's no science behind it.

I suppose I should clarify in more clear terms: I want to make a system that works to a degree, which doesn't hinge on too much science(A bit is fine), which doesn't hinge on magic or superstition(Again, a bit is fine, but that's going to be it's own category in the book).
It should be archaic, but not useless(Aristotle), and it should be functional, but not scientific and/or magic.

[S_A_M I AM]

Before anybody puts any more suggestions in your hat: You might be drawing a longer bow than you strictly need to.

If you're basing this on the 15th century: The 15th century where? What kind of enviroments would the naturalists of your setting have been exposed to? Would you even need to include dinosaurs and why would anybody except somebody looking for underlying similarities in bone structure class the various old animals that you're including based on hip shape (and a variety of other factors I don't understand) rather than any other given factor?

[brian 333]

Scorpions are related to one another in our world, but a person with no scientific training would see a scorpion and instantly relate it to crawfish and crabs. Spiders might be considered insects or might be a separate animal classification, but its relationship to decapodal arthropods is only apparent under a microscope.

Ursines and canines are obviously related, and obviously related to raccoons and their extended families. Just look at their faces. Felines don't quite look like the more dog-looking carnivores.

On the other hand, hyenas do look and act very much like dogs, even though they are weasels.

So, behaviorally and generally Carnivores are similar enough to be a family group, but different enough to be broken into cats, dogs, bears, raccoons, and weasels, with some cats slipping into the weasel family due to enlongated, short-legged bodies while hyenas creep into the dog family because they are pack hunters.

And so on and so forth.

Somewhere along the way you just have to pull an Aristotle and declare a thing to be so even in the face of contradictory evidence. For example, are snails related to crabs because they have a shell? Are snails not related to oysters because they cannot produce nacre? And what about squids and octopi? We know because we have DNA testing, but Aristotle didn't.

[Honest Tiefling]

Perhaps to make it easier for yourself, limit the number of animals in the system? I mean, if its Archaic, chances are no one can hop onto a plane and see exotic animals or take a trip to the zoo. If we assume a North European biome for the sake of an example, elephants, monkeys and a few other outliers (fossa, binturogs, platypi, etc.) can be ignored.

Also look at other languages, particularly those with fewer words to distinguish animals. For instance, in Spanish, both turtles and tortoises are simply 'tortuga', probably meaning they have far less arguments on the subject.

You could also group things with a similar physical or behavioral features, since that is what olden people did. Is it a mammal in the ocean? Let's just group those in the furry and non-furry categories. Does it look like a bear? We'll just shove anything with small rounded ears into the bear category.

Also, Hyenas aren't mustelids. They're their own thing.

[brian 333]

Also, Hyenas aren't mustelids. They're their own thing.

My Honest friend is correct. Back when I studied these things hyenas were classed as weasels due to their dentition which is very similar to that of wolverines and fishers. DNA testing allows more accurate placement in the family tree, which indicates, after a bit of browsing on my part, that they are more closely related to civets, which were a branch of the cat family back then, but now appear to have co-evolved with felines.

So, in a less than forty year interval our modern bestiaries have undergone revision. They were based on observation, which often placed similar animals in a family which, in the end, were not closely related after all.

The point being, when you build your bestiary, decide your parameters and go for broke, and don't worry if your hedgehog, echidna, and porcupine end up in a family of prickly-haired beasts.

[Mechalich]

Perhaps to make it easier for yourself, limit the number of animals in the system? I mean, if its Archaic, chances are no one can hop onto a plane and see exotic animals or take a trip to the zoo. If we assume a North European biome for the sake of an example, elephants, monkeys and a few other outliers (fossa, binturogs, platypi, etc.) can be ignored.

Relevant to this: Aristotle only classified around 500 vertebrate animals, and he was operating in a Mediterranean environment with exposure to a relatively large number of different climates compared to many other persons in the ancient world.

An archaic taxonomy simply isn't going to function at the species level except in the case of a very small number of extremely prominent examples - large bodied mammals mostly, certain notable birds, food plants - and most languages won't even have words for descriptions below the genus or even family level. Shrews, for example, are a family with high diversity. France alone hosts ten species. However, in an archaic scenario, people who probably consider all shrews to be the same type of animals, differentiated only by size if at all.

Aristotle's taxonomic system - which is really the only formal archaic taxonomy there is, non-western societies don't seem to have developed this field in detail - was based on what were actually pretty good observations of morphological traits given the tools available to him. No microscopes, poor equipment for dissections, and no collection libraries for comparisons of large numbers of organisms at once (the Linnaean system was developed using plants, and relatively modern herbarium techniques were developed prior to its creation).

As a result, I'd suggest that you shouldn't worry about phyla outside of Chordates for your system really at all. Those can be completely ad hoc. What you want is a system that can differentiate major groups of fish, break fish from tetrapods, differentiate major tetrapod groups, and then meaningfully differentiate birds and mammals to somewhere around the superorder level.

A big factor here is how many extinct and/or purely fantastical organisms are wandering around your setting. Take just 'fish' for example. Modern groups gets you hagfish, lampreys, Chondrichthyes, Actinopterygii, and Sarcopterygii. Extinct groups adds in Placodermi, Acanthodii, a whole mess of 'jawless fish' groups like the Osteostraci, and even Conodonts. Tetrapods is worse and extinct mammals worse still.

[Nifft]

That's also kind of missing the point. The problem is, I'm not looking for an ignorant system

Ah, you got hung up on a word.

In this context, that meant "non-modern-genetics".

That word has now been replaced so you may now proceed to read the rest of the post:

Trait ideas for non-modern-genetics categorization schemes:

Domestic vs. Trainable vs. Wild -> Can this animal be domesticated? Can it be trained? Or is it useless to our civilization?

Sun-blessed vs. Night-seeking -> Is this animal nocturnal? We all know that darkness = evil so that's probably super important.

Elemental Affiliation -> Frogs and otters and sea-snakes and jellyfish are all clearly Water-aspected, unlike toads and foxes and garter-snakes and slugs.

Fiend-shape vs. Honest -> Can a vampire control creatures of this type? Can an Imp or Quasit turn into one? If so, it's probably untrustworthy.

If you're in a world where vampires exist, and vampires can control 2-3 species of vermin, that type of vermin ought to have a category -- and also be targeted for extermination in cities which don't want vampire residents.

[demonslayerelf]

Perhaps to make it easier for yourself, limit the number of animals in the system? I mean, if its Archaic, chances are no one can hop onto a plane and see exotic animals or take a trip to the zoo. If we assume a North European biome for the sake of an example, elephants, monkeys and a few other outliers (fossa, binturogs, platypi, etc.) can be ignored.

Relevant to this: Aristotle only classified around 500 vertebrate animals, and he was operating in a Mediterranean environment with exposure to a relatively large number of different climates compared to many other persons in the ancient world.

An archaic taxonomy simply isn't going to function at the species level except in the case of a very small number of extremely prominent examples - large bodied mammals mostly, certain notable birds, food plants - and most languages won't even have words for descriptions below the genus or even family level. Shrews, for example, are a family with high diversity. France alone hosts ten species. However, in an archaic scenario, people who probably consider all shrews to be the same type of animals, differentiated only by size if at all.

As a result, I'd suggest that you shouldn't worry about phyla outside of Chordates for your system really at all. Those can be completely ad hoc. What you want is a system that can differentiate major groups of fish, break fish from tetrapods, differentiate major tetrapod groups, and then meaningfully differentiate birds and mammals to somewhere around the superorder level.

A big factor here is how many extinct and/or purely fantastical organisms are wandering around your setting. Take just 'fish' for example. Modern groups gets you hagfish, lampreys, Chondrichthyes, Actinopterygii, and Sarcopterygii. Extinct groups adds in Placodermi, Acanthodii, a whole mess of 'jawless fish' groups like the Osteostraci, and even Conodonts. Tetrapods is worse and extinct mammals worse still.

So, I'm just kinda going to respond to this in a block here. Because some clarification is needed.

This isn't specifically for any one world, or any specific location on the world. This is to cover dnd. Are dinosaurs running around? Certainly, in some worlds, and that means I'm going to include them. I'm not gonna go sort of hyper-analytical and include the smallest variation of fly, but the fact that Dinosaurs are within gaming worlds means it's worth talking about and categorizing.

I'm not going far into each of them, just the big umbrellas, and maybe some sub-categorization, a little, so I don't need a million type of fish(I'm thinking three; Toothed Fish(Ie; Sharks and Dolphins and Toothed Whales), Bony Fish(Ie; Fish), Flabby Fish(Ie; Whales)), or a million different types of wolf, or etc. Just the broad strokes, but those broad strokes need to have merit to them. And, unfortunately, need to cover a lot.

Now on the specifics;
@Brian; I'm not worrying about the complete scientific inaccuracy of certain groups. In fact, "Spiny animals" could just be it's own group... Maybe. I'm thinking about it. And I like the Bear/Cat/Canine/Raccoons/Rodents(Changed from weasels, because they look like big rodents, and mice exist), so I'm probably gonna use that :p

@Tiefling; Yeah, I know about the turtles and tortoises. I'm shoving them all into a "Shelled Animals" category, along with clams, snails, and probably some other things.

It's not so much a problem for those guys, more so for things like... Elephants. And Hippopotamus. And apes.

[Gaslampgenie]

For those animals that dont quite fit into a neat category like hippos and elephants: i wouldnt sweat making an elegant solution.
The people categorizing animals way back when the field was new probably didn't know what the hell to do with animals like that who didn't quite fit into any categories they knew about. Inelegant, and band aid fixes are really common in developing fields of study or practice and having some of those could be really flavorful for a setting.
Plus, like we saw earlier in the thread, these classifications change rapidly as people discover new things. You could come up with any number of solutions and implement different ones in different settings as the scientists of the world make more discoveries. This way you can test a solution out and ditch it if you don't like it, and it wouldn't break the continuity in the world.