Plants & CreaturesGreek → English
Saprophyte
/ˈsæprəfaɪt/noun
An organism that feeds on dead and decaying matter.
The Greek roots
σαπρός
saprós
rotten, putrid
φυτόν
phytón
plant, thing grown
Literally: “rot plant”
The story of the word
σαπρός is the word for food gone off and wood gone soft, anything past saving. A saprophyte makes its living from exactly that, secreting enzymes outside its own body and absorbing what dissolves. The name has aged badly, since the standard examples are fungi and bacteria rather than plants, and biologists now write saprotroph rather than call a mushroom a φυτόν.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
saprotrophepiphytexerophyteneophyte
In a sentence
Every fallen trunk in the wood is being eaten by saprophytes from the inside.
Without saprophytes the forest floor would be metres deep in leaves.