Caudex

As a caudex of the entire shoot of a plant is called, often the trunk of a tree, the shoot base, the rhizome of ferns and the like. This is a not well-defined morphological term. In French, thus thickened shoot parts are usually referred.

The term caudex was already used in antiquity by Pliny, who was referring to the trunk of trees. In modern times it is re-used by Leonhart Fuchs in his work De Historia Stirpium ( 1542) and later by Heinrich Friedrich Link (1798 ), so that the stem axis and root system designated.