Definition of root

• (botany) the usually underground organ that lacks buds or leaves or nodes; absorbs water and mineral salts; usually it anchors the plant to the ground
• (linguistics) the form of a word after all affixes are removed; "thematic vowels are part of the stem"
• the place where something begins, where it springs into being; "the Italian beginning of the Renaissance"; "Jupiter was the origin of the radiation"; "Pittsburgh is the source of the Ohio River"; "communisms Russian root"