herbarium

American  

[hur-bair-ee-uhm, ur-] / hɜrˈbɛər i əm, ɜr- /

noun

plural

herbariums, herbaria

1. a collection of dried plants systematically arranged.

2. a room or building in which such a collection is kept.

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herbarium British  

/ hɜːˈbɛərɪəm /

noun

1. a collection of dried plants that are mounted and classified systematically

2. a building, room, etc, in which such a collection is kept

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Other Word Forms

• herbarial
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of herbarium

1770–80; < Late Latin, equivalent to Latin herb ( a ) herb, green vegetation + -ārium -arium

Explanation

A herbarium is a collection of preserved plants. Think of it as a library of herbs. A herbarium can be something as simple as that book of pressed flowers you made at summer camp, or as complex as a building that holds case after case of flowers soaked in formaldehyde, dried moss stored in archival quality envelopes, and cones from conifers organized in boxes. Find these larger collections at universities, botanical gardens, and natural history museums.

Example Sentences

This intensive fieldwork resulted in over a thousand new specimens deposited at the National Herbarium of Canada at the Canadian Museum of Nature and other herbaria worldwide.

From Science Daily • Mar. 12, 2024

It’s a matter of “eliminating the commemoration of people who caused untold human misery,” says one author, botanist Estrela Figueiredo of Nelson Mandela University’s Ria Olivier Herbarium.

From Science Magazine • Sep. 5, 2023

AMY ROSSMAN: She got a job at the Gray Herbarium, which included fungi at that time, preparing fungi and working on them, and that's where she got her background in mycology.

From Scientific American • Jan. 26, 2023

Denise Molmou, a botanist with the UGAN-National Herbarium of Guinea, discovered this plant — which has since been named Saxicolella deniseae after her — in 2018.

From Salon • Sep. 7, 2022

The "Bailey Herbarium," the "Herbarium Olneyanum," and the "Bennett Herbarium," contain altogether seventy-one thousand eight hundred specimens, arranged in good order for consultation, and constituting an important addition to the means of instruction in Botany.

From The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, January 1886 Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 1, January, 1886 by Various