Hyacinthoides non-scripta was first described by Carl Linnaeus in his seminal 1753 work Species Plantarum, as a species in the genus Hyacinthus.] The specific epithet non-scriptus means "unlettered" or "unmarked" and was intended to distinguish this plant from the classical hyacinth of Greek mythology. This mythical flower, which was almost certainly not the modern hyacinth, sprang up from the blood of the dying prince Hyacinthus. His lover, the god Apollo, shed tears that marked the new flower's petals with the letters "AIAI" ("alas") as a sign of his grief. In 1803, Johann Centurius von Hoffmannsegg and Johann Heinrich Friedrich Link transferred the species to the genus Scilla, and in 1849 Christian August Friedrich Garcke transferred it to the genus Endymion (now a synonym of Hyacinthoides); it is still widely known as "Scilla non-scripta" or "Endymion non-scriptus". In 1934, Pierre Chouard transferred the species to its current placement in the genus Hyacinthoides. Scilla was the original Greek name for the sea squill, Drimia maritima; Endymion is a character from Greek mythology; Hyacinthoides means "like a hyacinth".
