Word.ws English Dictionary

flagellae

flagellae is the plural of flagellum.

Meaning of flagellum

Noun

flagellum (plural flagella or flagellums or (proscribed) flagellae)

  1. In protists, a long, whiplike membrane-enclosed organelle used for locomotion or feeding.
    Synonyms:
    cilium
  2. In bacteria, a long, whiplike proteinaceous appendage, used for locomotion.
  3. (formal) A whip.
    Synonyms:
    whip

Origin of flagellae

Mistakenly formed, either as a Latin-style plural of flagella by taking the latter to be a singular noun while actually it is a plural (namely the plural of flagellum) or by mistaking -ae (a feminine plural) as a possible plural of nouns in -um (neuter).

Questions about flagellae

What is flagellae the plural of?
Flagellae is the plural of flagellum.

Words near flagellae in the dictionary

  1. flagboat
  2. flagboats
  3. flagcem
  4. flagecidin
  5. flagella
  6. flagellae
  7. flagellant
  8. flagellantism
  9. flagellantisms
  10. flagellants
  11. flagellar

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: flagellae (page history and authors); flagellum (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “flagellae.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/flagellae. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.