Raceme

Raceme (from the Latin racemus, "a bunch of grapes") is the term applied in botany to a type of inflorescence (q.v.) in which the main axis or podium is elongated, its terminal bud being the last to unfold, whilst lateral buds succeed one another indefinitely and acropetally. A simple raceme has but one order of branches, as in the mustards, cresses, and most Cruciferae (q.v.); the bunch of grape-blossoms, being repeatedly branched, is a compound raceme. The spike (q.v.) differs only in its sessile flowers. When the lower flowers have longer pedicels, so as to bring them to a level with others produced later, the raceme is corymbose, as in the wall-flower. When the flowers are all borne on one side of the axis, it is a dorsiventral raceme, and will often become scorpioid, as in forget-me-not. The raceme may be dense, with flowers closely ranged, or lax, with them wide apart; bracteate, as in the wild hyacinth, or ebracteate, as in the Cruciferae.