Now multiply this by thousands of different languages and dialects, and we have common name chaos, worldwide. From one geographical area to another, even within the same country, we use more than one common name in the same language to describe the same shark species. One man's mako is another man's bonito shark . One man's smalleye hammerhead is another man's golden hammerhead. The better known sharks usually have several common names in the same language throughout the world.
Some sharks are so rare they lack any common name, having only a scientific name.
In some instances a singular common name is applied to several species . Of course we are all going to still use common names for sharks but we should be aware there is another method less ambiguous. That is using scientific names. Enter Carl von Linne. In 1758, a Swedish botanist, Carl von Linne ' established a latinized binomial system to classify the various species, including sharks of course.