What’s in a Name?

In my recent post about the Psychology of collecting, one of the most interesting topics Professor Mark B. McKinley wrote about are the names for collectors of certain things. This is especially fun for me because I’m also a collector of unusual words and word derivations. (Isn’t it true that collectors have many collections, not just one?) Many people know that a ’numismatist’ collects coins and a ’philatelist’ collects stamps, but did you know that an archtophilist collects teddy bears, a deltiologist collects postcards, a vecturist collects subway tokens and a clock collector is called a horologist.? One of the funniest names is a Spermologist, who collect seeds. Not to be confused with a spermologer who is someone that collects trivia. Perhaps there should be a unique word for people who collect souvenir buildings. Most words seem to employ ‘-ist’ (practicing, specializing) or ‘-ologist’ (study of) suffixes, but others have an ‘-ophile’ (loving, fond of) at the end. Perhaps, as a distinguished group of collectors, we could be known as Buildophiles, Souvenirophiles, SouBuildologists, Archophiles or collectocrats. Possibilities could take many forms including Momentophile or my favorite so far, Edificeophie. Send me your ideas for a scientific name for building collectors.

To get your creative juices flowing, here are more collector names...
Collectors of dolls are called plangonologists.
A collector of paper money is called a notaphilist
A labeorphilist is a collector of beer bottles.
A collector of butterflies is called a lepidopterist.
Conchologists collect animal shells.
Collectors of matchbooks / matchbook covers are phillumenists
A collector of antiques is an antiquarian.
If you collect obsidian and syenite you are called a rock hound.
A scripophilist collects old stocks and bonds.
A knife collector is called a machirologist.
A stamp collector is called a philatelist.
A pernalogist is a collector of pearls.
Cinephiles are film collectors.
A bibiophilist collects books.
A copoclephilist collects key rings.
A deltiologist collects post cards.
A collector of hi-fi equipment is called an audiophile

Also, check out this collector’s name quiz and see how many you know.