a term in botany for the female or seed-bearing organ of a flower. The Lat. pistillum (diminutive from pinsere, pistum, to pound), a pestle, a club-headed instrument used for crushing or braying substances in a mortar, was taken as the name for this organ from its similarity in shape, and thence adapted in Fr. pistil about the middle of the 18th century. In its complete form a pistil consists of three parts - ovary, at the base, containing the bodies which become seeds, style (Gr. 6Taos, pillar), and stigma (Gr. arty pa, mark, aTL -av, to brand), the part which in impregnation receives the pollen.