spica

plural spicas · plural spicae

1. biologyA spike (kind of inflorescence in which sessile flowers are arranged on an unbranched elongated axis).
2. biologyA spur.
3. A kind of bandage passing, by successive turns and crosses, from an extremity to the trunk; a spiral bandage with reversed turns.

1. astronomyA binary star in the constellation Virgo; alpha (α) Virginis.

   The constellation Virgo is a Y-shaped group, of which α, the star at the foot, is the well-known Spica, a star of the first magnitude.

   1920, Edward Carpenter, Pagan and Christian Creeds, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., published 1921