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Published In: Species Plantarum 2: 587. 1753. (1 May 1753) (Sp. Pl.) Name publication detailView in BotanicusView in Biodiversity Heritage Library
 

Project Name Data (Last Modified On 7/9/2009)
Project Data     (Last Modified On 7/9/2009)
Status: Introduced

 

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Plants annual or perennial herbs, usually with fibrous roots. Stems erect or strongly ascending, sometimes from a spreading base, slender, sharply 4-angled, branched throughout, sometimes with stoloniferous, prostrate, basal branches, glabrous or soft-hairy. Leaves sessile or petiolate, the petiole unwinged (except sometimes near the tip), with a faint or strong fragrance when crushed. Leaf blades variously shaped, sometimes dimorphic, the margins entire or toothed, the surfaces glabrous or hairy, also with sometimes conspicuous, sessile glands. Inflorescences axillary, small clusters of 2–8 per node, the flowers stalked, the stalk with a pair of bractlets at the base. Calyces zygomorphic, lacking a lateral projection, more or less symmetric to pouched along 1 side at the base, more or less cylindric (appearing somewhat flask-shaped at fruiting), the tube strongly 10–13-nerved (-ribbed), with a fringe of short, bristly hairs in the mouth, 2-lipped, the lobes shorter than to about as long as the tube, the upper lip shallowly to deeply 3-lobed, the lower lip deeply 2-lobed, the lobes narrowly to broadly triangular, not spinescent, not becoming enlarged and papery at fruiting. Corollas zygomorphic, pink to pale purple, rarely white or nearly so, the outer surface sparsely to moderately short-hairy and with inconspicuous sessile glands, the tube funnelform, relatively shallowly 2-lipped, the upper lip shallowly 2-lobed, slightly concave to spreading to recurved, the lower lip more or less straight to slightly spreading, 3-lobed. Stamens 4, not exserted, the upper 2 stamens with slightly shorter filaments than the lower pair, the anthers small, the connective about as broad as the pollen sacs and trapezoidal, the pollen sacs 2, broadly angled from the separated tips, pink or pinkish-tinged. Ovary deeply lobed, the style appearing lateral to nearly basal from a deep apical notch. Style usually slightly exserted, unequally 2-branched at the tip. Fruits dry schizocarps, separating into usually 4 nutlets, these 1.0–1.4 mm long, oblongobovoid to oblong-ellipsoid, the surface brown to dark brown, glabrous, but sometimes with a mealy deposit. About 100 species, nearly worldwide.

The taxonomy of the so-called Satureja L. complex remains incompletely understood. It has been treated variously as a single large genus (Epling and Játiva, 1966) or as many as 17 small genera (Doroszenko, 1985). Based on a preliminary molecular study (Wagstaff et al., 1995), followed by an examination of morphology from herbarium specimens of a larger group of species, Cantino and Wagstaff (1998) concluded that the European Satureja officinalis L. (savory) represents a genus distinct from the approximately 225 other species placed into that genus by earlier botanists, but that the majority of the remaining species form a single group for which the oldest valid name is Clinopodium, rather than Satureja. However, generic limits remain unclear, as the molecular data failed to resolve a large lineage that includes such diverse genera as Blephilia, Hedeoma, and i, and also failed to address the separation of Acinos and Calamintha, which some authors have maintained as distinct (DeWolf, 1954). The conclusions of Cantino and Wagstaff (1998) are followed here mainly for the pragmatic reason that our species fall into two complexes that are difficult to distinguish as genera.
 

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1 Stems finely hairy throughout; main stem leaves elliptic to somewhat rhombic or less commonly slightly obovate, hairy, at least along the margins and veins; calyces pouched along 1 side at the base, hairy along the ribs. Clinopodium acinos
+ Stems glabrous, except for inconspicous, short hairs at some nodes; flowering stem leaves (except sometimes at the stem base) linear to narrowly oblanceolate, glabrous; calyces more or less symmetric at the base, not pouched, not hairy. Clinopodium arkansanum
 
 
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