Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun See rachis.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Anat.) The spine.
  • noun The continued stem or midrib of a pinnately compound leaf, as in a rose leaf or a fern.
  • noun The principal axis in a raceme, spike, panicle, or corymb.
  • noun The shaft of a feather. The rhachis of the after-shaft, or plumule, is called the hyporhachis.
  • noun The central cord in the stem of a crinoid.
  • noun The median part of the radula of a mollusk.
  • noun A central cord of the ovary of nematodes.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Alternative spelling of rachis.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Half a dozen ants may be seen perpetually engaged in, apparently, an unmethodical but extremely minute and critical inspection of the rhachis and the nerves or ribs of the leaf.

    The Confessions of a Beachcomber 2003

  • The leaflets and rhachis are covered in dense, shoe, rough brown hair.

    Chapter 8 1996

  • Between each leaflet there is a nectary gland on the leaf rhachis; in 1. edulis these are large (2 to 3 mm) and squashed transversely, an important character for identifying the species.

    Chapter 8 1996

  • Between each leaflet there is a nectary gland on the leaf rhachis; in 1. edulis these are large (2 to 3 mm) and squashed transversely, an important character for identifying the species.

    Chapter 9 1990

  • The leaflets and rhachis are covered in dense, short, rough brown hair.

    Chapter 9 1990

  • Leaflets ovate or nearly so, with obtuse or acute apex; rhachis somewhat pubescent.

    Northern Nut Growers Association Thirty-Fourth Annual Report 1943

  • Leaflets lanceolate, with acuminate apex; rhachis glabrous.

    Northern Nut Growers Association Thirty-Fourth Annual Report 1943

  • Half a dozen ants may be seen perpetually engaged in, apparently, an unmethodical but extremely minute and critical inspection of the rhachis and the nerves or ribs of the leaf.

    Confessions of a Beachcomber 1887

  • Equinoctial America nowhere produces, not even on the back of the Andes, an oak resembling the Quercus suber; and neither the light wood of the bombax, the ochroma, and other malvaceous plants, nor the rhachis of maize, of which the natives make use, can well supply the place of our corks.

    Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America 1851

  • Equinoctial America nowhere produces, not even on the back of the Andes, an oak resembling the Quercus suber; and neither the light wood of the bombax, the ochroma, and other malvaceous plants, nor the rhachis of maize, of which the natives make use, can well supply the place of our corks.

    Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Year 1799-1804 — Volume 2 Alexander von Humboldt 1814

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