Brevifolia

Brevifolia is a botanical epithet used in the scientific names of many plant species. The epithet comes from Latin, combining brevis meaning "short" and folium meaning "leaf," and it describes a plant with relatively short leaves compared with related species. In botanical nomenclature, brevifolia is the feminine form and must agree with the gender of the genus; masculine and neuter forms—brevifolius and brevifolium—are used where appropriate.

Usage and scope: The epithet is descriptive and not diagnostic of a single lineage. It appears across diverse plant groups and families, from herbs to trees, wherever a species is noted to have shorter leaves. Because many unrelated lineages can share similar leaf morphology, brevifolia does not imply close relatedness between the taxa that bear it.

Taxonomic notes: The epithet is always written in lowercase and is not capitalized, even at the start of a sentence in formal text. In some historical texts, orthography variants have appeared, but modern taxonomic practice generally standardizes the form to the gender of the genus.

See also: Latin terms used in botanical nomenclature; List of plant epithets.