capitate

American  

[kap-i-teyt] / ˈkæp ɪˌteɪt /

adjective

1. Botany. forming or shaped like a head or dense cluster.

2. Biology. having an enlarged or swollen, headlike termination.

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capitate British  

/ ˈkæpɪˌteɪt /

adjective

1. botany shaped like a head, as certain flowers or inflorescences

2. zoology having an enlarged headlike end

   a capitate bone

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capitate Scientific  

/ kăp′ĭ-tāt′ /

1. The largest of the carpal bones.

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1. Forming a headlike mass or dense cluster, as the flowers of plants in the composite family.

Other Word Forms

• multicapitate adjective

Etymology

Origin of capitate

1655–65; < Latin capitātus headed, equivalent to capit- (stem of caput ) head + -ātus -ate ¹

Example Sentences

Style undivided, terminated by a single capitate or 2–3-globose stigma.

From Project Gutenberg

Its flowers are purple, lilac, or rose-colored—never yellow; the anthers are basifixed—i.e. fixed by their bases—not versatile; and the stigma, instead of being capitate, has four linear lobes.

From Project Gutenberg

Some or all of the anthers become twisted so that insects in probing for honey will touch the anthers with one side of their head and the capitate stigma with the other.

From Project Gutenberg

The carpels are united to form a 4- to 5-chambered ovary, which bears a simple elongated style ending in a capitate stigma; each ovary-chamber contains one to many ovules attached to a central placenta.

From Project Gutenberg

Pistils from five to ten, capitate at their summits, affixed laterally to the middle of the seeds, as in Alchemilla.

From Project Gutenberg