What is "orismology"

Orismology \O`ris*mol"o*gy\ ([=o]`r[i^]s*m[o^]l"[-o]*j[y^]), n. [Gr. "orismo`s a marking out by boundaries, the definition of a word + -logy. See Horizon.] That department of natural history which treats of technical terms; the science of defining technical terms.

n. (context rare English) The explanation of technical terms; also technical terms collectively, terminology.

Orismology is the identification, specification, and description of technical terms. The word is constructed from the Greek: orismos (definition) and logos (word, reasoning, study). The word was coined by William Kirby and William Spence in their Introduction to Entomology in the early 1800s: "In the terminology, or what, to avoid the barbarism of a word compounded of Latin and Greek, [Kirby and Spence] would beg to call orismology of the science, they have endeavoured to introduce throughout a greater degree of precision and concinnity" in the terms used to talk about insects. This approach to naming is particularly applied to disciplines in natural sciences like Kirby and Spence's entomology that depend upon classificatory schemes, such as taxonomies and ontologies, to organize, name, and address their subject matter.