What does "viridae" mean?

[WeRSauron]

What does “viridae” mean? When and how it is used?

WRS

[Josh_dePlume]

“Viridae” is the taxonomic group containing viruses. Kind of a bogus group, since viruses don’t all share a common ancestor.

[SavageNarce]

If it’s any help, viridae is Latin, and it’s a plural. So if you used it in text, it should be italicized to indicate it is not an English word, and the plurality should be recognized (“These viridae”, not “This viridae”)

[Bear_Nenno]

@Josh_dePlume

“Viridae” is the taxonomic group containing viruses. Kind of a bogus group, since viruses don’t all share a common ancestor.

Not to mention the fact that they’re not really alive.

[Mirror_Image_egamI_rorriM]

I think it means “green” in Latin. I don’t have my dictionary right now, though, so I can’t be sure.

[WeRSauron]

@SavageNarce

If it’s any help, viridae is Latin, and it’s a plural. So if you used it in text, it should be italicized to indicate it is not an English word, and the plurality should be recognized (“These viridae”, not “This viridae”)

What is it plural of? If it’s plural of “virus,” why is it not touted as one acceptable form of the plural of “virus” (the other acceptable form being “viruses”)?

WRS

[David_Simmons]

@Mirror Image egamI rorriM

I think it means “green” in Latin. I don’t have my dictionary right now, though, so I can’t be sure.

If it is about viruses then it comes from Latin virus meaning “toxic” or “poison.”

[Colibri]

@WeRSauron

What is it plural of? If it’s plural of “virus,” why is it not touted as one acceptable form of the plural of “virus” (the other acceptable form being “viruses”)?

WRS

It’s just the standard biological Family ending -idae (Canidae, Felidae, Anatidae) tacked on to “virus.”

The problem is that “virus” does not have any valid plural in Latin, being a “mass noun” instead of a “count noun.” See bibliophage’s Staff Report on Latin plurals for more details.

[lno]

@Mirror Image egamI rorriM

I think it means “green” in Latin. I don’t have my dictionary right now, though, so I can’t be sure.

You’re thinking of viridis.

@WeRSauron

What does “viridae” mean? When and how it is used?

From Merriam-Webster’s explanatory notes on virus nomenclature:

Except as noted below, the names for species, genera, and families of viruses used in this dictionary are those that are recognized by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. Such names appear in italics and are preceded by the name of the taxon (“species,” “genus,” or “family”) in roman before the italicized name.

The name of a species consists of an italicized phrase in which the first word is capitalized, other words are lowercase unless derived from a proper name, and the last word is virus.

The name of a genus is usually a single capitalized word ending in -virus.

The name of a family is a single capitalized word ending in -viridae.

**small·pox** . . . *noun* . . . : an acute contagious febrile disease of humans that is caused by a poxvirus (species *Variola virus* of the genus *Orthopoxvirus* . . . 

The name of the family in this case can be found at the entry for poxvirus:

**pox·vi·rus** . . . *noun* . . . : any of a family (*Poxviridae*) of brick-shaped or ovoid double-stranded DNA viruses

@WeRSauron

What is it plural of? If it’s plural of “virus,” why is it not touted as one acceptable form of the plural of “virus” (the other acceptable form being “viruses”)?

This is a complex story. I’ll summarize.

The word “virus” has no plural in Latin, and the English plural is “viruses”, not “virii”, “viri”, or “viruslotsofthemIswear”. Some resources that detail this in more … detail … are Wikipedia’s entry and an excellent article What’s the Plural of ‘Virus’? that’s bounced around the web for a while.

@SavageNarce

If it’s any help, viridae is Latin, and it’s a plural. So if you used it in text, it should be italicized to indicate it is not an English word, and the plurality should be recognized (“These viridae”, not “This viridae”)

From what I can discern, the word viridae originated either with Carolus Linnaeus or the International Union of Microbiological Societies. Also, an -ae ending is not necessarily indicative of a plural form. Do you have any more information on the origin of this word?
(After preview, I see that Colibri linked to a very informative Staff Report. However, bibliophage’s link in that Report is no longer valid. Fortunately, the article he was linking is available elsewhere online, such as at my final link above.)

(Plus, I’m not gonna waste this work.)

(And thanks, Colibri, for explaining the origin of viridae. I was going nuts…)