I recently observed a few seeds of Platanus, which got me thinking. The Spanish name listed for the genus is “sicómoros”. They are called “sycamores” in English, but as I speak Spanish mostly at church, so when I hear “sicómoro” I think of the tree that Zacchaeus climbed, which was a fig. So I looked up all the species. Not counting one which has no common name in English or Spanish and only one observation, they fall in four groups.
“Plátano” is the oldest Spanish name for these trees, and like the genus name, it descends from the Greek “πλάτανος”, which was probably borrowed from Pre-Greek.
Platanus kerrii: plátano de Kerr
Platanus orientalis: platán (no entry in either Wiktionary)
Platanus × hispanica: plátano
“Plátano” is also used for the bananas called “plantains” in English (not to be confused with Plantago, which is “llantén” in Spanish), or in some dialects all bananas.
“Sicómoro”, as above, is properly a species of fig, but the English “sycamore” is used for both planes and a species of maple.
Platanus occidentalis: sicómoro americano
Platanus rzedowskii: sicomoro (Wiktionary lists this as a variant)
Platanus wrightii: sicómoro de Arizona
“Álamo” is poplar, which is also called “chopo” from Latin “plōppus”, a variant of “pōpulus”, but:
Platanus mexicana: álamo blanco
Where I live, yet another tree is called poplar, the tuliptree, which is a magnoliid.
“Aliso” is alder, but:
Platanus racemosa: aliso
If you speak Spanish and live near any of these trees, what do you call them?