Acaceous

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Pertaining to or characteristic of plants belonging to the legume family, noted for their compound leaves and pod-like fruits
2. Relating to members of a family of flowering plants that typically bear seed pods and often fix nitrogen in the soil
3. Describing species within a botanical group known for producing pods and having distinctive leaf structures characteristic of legumes

Etymology: Acaceous describes plants of the acacia group, which belong to the legume family. The word is a straightforward formation: "acacia" plus the English adjective suffix "-aceous," which means "of the nature of" or "resembling." The suffix comes from Latin "-aceus," used to form adjectives from nouns, so the word means something like "acacia-like." Acacia itself reaches English through Latin "acacia" from Greek "akakia," the name of a thorny Egyptian tree, and the Greek word is probably related to "akis," meaning "point" or "thorn," a reference to the spiny branches. The name was applied to a wide genus of trees and shrubs, native mainly to Australia, Africa, and the Americas, and "acaceous" followed as a technical term among botanists who needed a way to describe the group.

Synonyms: acacia-like, leguminous