Plants & CreaturesGreek → English
Euphorbia
/juːˈfɔːbiə/noun
A vast genus of plants with milky caustic sap, ranging from garden spurges to cactus-like desert succulents.
The Greek roots
εὖ
eû
well
φορβή
phorbḗ
pasture, fodder
Literally: “well fed”
The story of the word
Pliny reports that King Juba II of Mauretania named the plant after his personal physician Euphorbus, whose own name meant well-nourished. Linnaeus kept the tribute when he formalised the genus, making it one of the oldest surviving personal dedications in botany. The sap is genuinely dangerous to eyes, which is a reasonable thing to know before pruning one.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
Same family
euphoriaeulogyforage
In a sentence
The euphorbia by the wall bleeds white sap the moment you cut it.
Half the plants people call cacti in African deserts are euphorbias.