Anthoxanthum

noun

An·tho·xan·thum

-thəm

: a genus of European grasses (family Poaceae) with contracted panicles, the spikelets consisting of one fertile floret and two sterile glumes below it see sweet vernal grass

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from New Latin (Linnaeus), Latinization of earlier anthoxanthon, from Greek antho- antho- + xanthón, neuter of xanthós "yellow"; so named from the yellowish color of the spike and seed in Anthoxanthum odoratum

Note: Linnaeus borrowed the name from a Gramen Anthoxanthon described and illustrated in Historia generalis plantarum (Lyons, 1587) by the French physician and botanist Jacques Daléchamps (vol. 1, pp. 425-26).