See text Cryosophila is a genus of medium-sized fan palms that range from central Mexico to northern Colombia.

Species in the genus can be readily distinguished from related genera by their distinctive downward-pointing spines on the stem, which are actually modified roots.

Cryosophila is a genus of medium-sized, single-stemmed (or rarely multi-stemmed) palms[1]: 6  with fan-shaped (or palmate) leaves and spiny stems.

[1]: 13 Trithrinax Itaya Sabinaria Chelyocarpus Cryosophila Schippia Thrinax Leucothrinax Hemithrinax Zombia Coccothrinax In the first edition of Genera Palmarum (1987), Natalie Uhl and John Dransfield placed the genus Cryosophila in subfamily Coryphoideae, tribe Corypheae and subtribe Thrinacinae[4]: 174–175  Subsequent phylogenetic analyses showed that the Old World and New World members of Thrinacinae are not closely related.

[6] The earliest botanical description of the species in the genus were made by Alexander von Humboldt, Aimé Bonpland and Carl Sigismund Kunth[1]: 5–6  in 1816.

He included two species in the genus, A. aculeata,[1] : 5–6  which he transferred from Trithrinax where it had been placed by Danish botanist Frederik Michael Liebmann when he described it in 1853,[1]: 53  and A. warscewiczii, for which Wendland provided the first description.