Spelling Bee Words from Eponym List

Eponyms are words based on a person's or character's name. Sometimes the person's name and the word are exactly the same and the word simply takes on a new meaning. In other cases the person's name is slightly changed. When the this happens, the stressed syllable of the new word can also change and you won't always recognize the origin, which might be somewhat a familiar name. Take, for example, gardenia. It's really just a man's name (Alexander Garden) with the plant-naming suffix -ia. In fact, all the words on this list that end with ia are names for plants and are based on the last names of botanists.