Eriospermum
Encyclopedia
Eriospermum is a genus of tuberous
flowering plant
s from South Africa
. "Eriospermum" is from the Greek
erion for "wool" and sperma for "seed". In the APG III classification system
, the genus is placed in the family
Asparagaceae
, subfamily Nolinoideae (formerly the family Ruscaceae). It was formerly placed in its own family, Eriospermaceae.
Tuber
Tubers are various types of modified plant structures that are enlarged to store nutrients. They are used by plants to survive the winter or dry months and provide energy and nutrients for regrowth during the next growing season and they are a means of asexual reproduction...
flowering plant
Flowering plant
The flowering plants , also known as Angiospermae or Magnoliophyta, are the most diverse group of land plants. Angiosperms are seed-producing plants like the gymnosperms and can be distinguished from the gymnosperms by a series of synapomorphies...
s from South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
. "Eriospermum" is from the Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
erion for "wool" and sperma for "seed". In the APG III classification system
APG III system
The APG III system of flowering plant classification is the third version of a modern, mostly molecular-based, system of plant taxonomy...
, the genus is placed in the family
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...
Asparagaceae
Asparagaceae
Asparagaceae is the botanical name of a family of flowering plants, placed in the order Asparagales of the monocots.In earlier classification systems, the species involved were often treated as belonging to the family Liliaceae...
, subfamily Nolinoideae (formerly the family Ruscaceae). It was formerly placed in its own family, Eriospermaceae.