pistil, the female reproductive part of a flower. The pistil, centrally located, typically consists of a swollen base, the ovary, which contains the potential seeds, or ovules; a stalk, or style, arising from the ovary; and a pollen-receptive tip, the stigma, variously shaped and often sticky.
Differences in the composition and form of the pistil are useful in determining taxonomic relationships. There may be a single pistil, as in the lily, or several to many pistils, as in the buttercup. Each pistil is constructed of from one to many enrolled leaflike structures, or carpels. The carpel is a single megasporophyll, or modified seed-bearing leaf. A pistil then may be composed of one carpel (simple pistil), as in the sweet pea, or of two or more carpels (compound pistil) partially or completely joined, as in the mustard (two carpels) or lily (three carpels).
A flower that contains separate pistils (and therefore separate carpels) is termed apocarpous; if it contains a single pistil with two or more united carpels, it is syncarpous.
Pistils in the collective sense form the gynoecium, in distinction to the male reproductive parts, or androecium.