title: Rename unique row values in data frame
body: <p>I am still quite fresh to <code>R</code>, but still I couldn't work around this.
  What I would like is to take unique row value, and rename it.</p>
  
  <pre><code>  Name    X        Y
  1 Var_1 23.57755 35.50492
  2 Var_2 23.57769 35.48199
  3 Var_1 23.57865 35.50202 
  4 Var_1a 23.57883 35.50120
  5 Var_2 23.57932 35.50197
  6 Var_1a 23.58040 35.50050
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This is part of my code, and I would like to take row name <code>Var_1a</code> for instance, and rename it to <code>Var_1</code>. </p>
  
  <p>I have several of unique values that need to be renamed, and reason is that it is species occurrence data, and some records have old scientific names, and I want for them to be all the same according to the latest taxonomy.</p>
  
  <p>Furthermore, I tried using <code>row.names()</code>, however I get the row ID (numbers) as row names, and part of my problem is not knowing how to get the <code>row.names()</code> function to read from the "Name" column. Also will it make a problem since new row will have duplicate name as old row name?!?</p>
  
  <p>Thank you.</p>