Bombacaceae

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A family of flowering plants known for their large, often tropical trees with distinctively shaped pods and fibers
2. A botanical group characterized by woody plants that typically have notable fibrous fruit and are commonly found in warm climates
3. A plant family that includes trees and shrubs with unique fruits and fibers, often utilized for their soft, cotton-like materials

Etymology: Bombacaceae is the botanical family name for a group of tropical trees and shrubs, including kapok, baobab relatives and the balsa tree. Its name comes from "Bombax," a genus name taken from Latin "bombyx," meaning silk or silkworm, a reference to the silky fibres in the seed pods of these trees. The family name is formed by adding the standard botanical ending "-aceae," which marks a family of plants, to the genus name. The family was long treated as a distinct group, but botanists have since reclassified many of its members. Several genera once placed here were moved into the mallow family, Malvaceae, and the name Bombacaceae is now often used informally or treated as a subfamily. Because older botanical texts used the name widely, it still appears in many reference works and herbaria.

Synonyms: bombax family