Hipólito Ruiz López and José Antonio Pavón Jiménez are jointly cited as the authors of many botanical names. Between 1779 and 1788 these Spanish botanists (together with the French botanist Joseph Dombey) visited Chile, Peru and other South American countries. Their standard author abbreviations are "Ruiz" and "Pav.", so that they are now jointly cited as "Ruiz & Pav." Ruiz y Pavón is the Spanish form of the Latin Ruiz et Pavón; both mean "Ruiz and Pavón".