2007-02-15

prettygoodword: text: words are sexy (Default)
2007-02-15 07:20 am

monadelphous

monadelphous - adj., (of a flower) having the stamens united in a single group.


"Usually forming a tube around the gynoecium," according to some dictionaries. Legumes are often monadelphous. This is a remnant of the eccentric Linnaean classification -- he coined it from roots that translate as "having a single band of brothers," Linnaeus being one to classify flowers by the familial relations of their parts.

---L.