Scaevola

It is a reference to the story of Gaius Mucius Scaevola (whose name comes from scaevus (“left”)), because the dried flowers recall a withered hand.

Scaevola f

1. A taxonomic genus within the family Goodeniaceae – many species of tropical flowering plants found especially in Australia and Polynesia.

• (genus): Eukaryota – superkingdom; Plantae – kingdom; Viridiplantae – subkingdom; Streptophyta – infrakingdom; Embryophyta – superphylum; Tracheophyta – phylum; Spermatophytina – subphylum; angiosperms, eudicots, core eudicots, asterids, euasterids II - clades; Asterales - order; Goodeniaceae - family

• (genus): Scaevola plumieri (gullfeed) - type species; Scaevola taccada (beach cabbage) - selected other species

• Scaevola (plant) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Scaevola on Wikispecies.Wikispecies
• Scaevola on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons
• Scaevola at USDA Plants database

From Scaeva (“agnomen & cognomen”) +‎ -ola (“-ole”, diminutive-forming suffix) or directly from scaevus (“left; left-handed; clumsy; very lucky or unlucky”) +‎ -ola.

(Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈskae̯.u̯o.la/, [ˈs̠käe̯u̯ɔɫ̪ä]

• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈʃe.vo.la/, [ˈʃɛːvolä]

Scaevola m sg (genitive Scaevolae); first declension

1. a cognomen of the gens Muncia and others

   Gaius Mucius Scaevola

    

First-declension noun, singular only.

• “Scaevola”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• Scaevola in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.