Commonly called the century plant[4] or tumbleweed,[2] Boophone disticha was first collected in 1781 from South Africa by Swedish botanist Carl Peter Thunberg and described by Carl Linnaeus as Amaryllis disticha.[3] Since that time it has been placed in the genera Brunsvigia and Haemanthus, finally coming to rest as Boophone. The genus itself was written in three ways (Boophone, Boophane and Buphane) by the author William Herbert, straining the procedures of the rules of nomenclature. The etymology of the genus is from the Greek bous = ox, and phontes= killer of, a clear warning that eating the plant can be fatal to livestock.[5]