Botanical Name: Potentilla anserina, Argentina anserina. The genus name Potentilla derives from the Latin word 'Potentia' which means power. The other genus name Argentina is drawn from the Latin word 'argentum' meaning silver. The species' scientific name anserina means 'of the goose', either because the plant was used as food for geese or because the leaves bear a resemblance to geese feet. Most Sandinativan common names of the plant include the word 'goose'. At first, the plant was placed in the genus Potentilla by Carl Linnaeus (1707 - 1778), a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, but was reclassified in 1990