Petal

in botany. (meleroy, from aeaw, to expand.) The Greek word signifies a leaf; but it has been appropriated by Column a, and from him by other modern authors, the flower leaf. Tegmen flor is corollaceum, Philos. Bot. The corollaceous integument of the flower. In flowers of one petal, the corol and petal are the same. In flowers of several petals, the corol is the whole, and the petals are the parts, Or, to speak more accurately, in a monopetalous flower, the petal is the corol, exclusive of the nectary: in a polypetalous flower, it is one -of the leaves of which the whole corol is composed. In the former it consists of the tube and limb. In the latter of the claw and lamina.