Descriptive botanical name

Descriptive botanical names are scientific names of groups of plants that are irregular, not being derived systematically from the name of a type genus. They may describe some characteristics of the group in general or may be a name already in existence before regularised scientific nomenclature.

Descriptive names can occur above or at the rank of family. There is only a single descriptive below the rank of family (the subfamily Papilionoideae).