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(Last Modified On 9/19/2013)
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(Last Modified On 9/19/2013)
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Family
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PEDALIACEAE
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Contributor
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W. G. D'ARCY
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Description
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Mostly herbs, often succulent, seldom shrubs, mostly with glandular hairs. Leaves opposite below, sometimes alternate upwards; petiolate, entire, toothed or lobed, often viscid, estipulate. Inflorescences of solitary flowers or few flow- ered cymes, axillary. Flowers perfect, zygomorphic, the calyx (4-)5 lobed to near the base; rarely saccate; corolla sympetalous, campanulate or tubular, 5-lobed, 2-lipped, the lobes imbricate in bud, sometimes gibbous; stamens 4, didynamous, the staminode posterior, the anthers free but often converging, 2-celled, longi- tudinally dehiscent the connective terminated by a gland; pistil 1, the ovary su- perior, the carpels 2 (3-4), the locules (1-) 2 or 4, the ovules 1-many in each locule, axile, anatropous, the style 1, slender, the stigmas 2. Fruit a loculicidal capsule, often appendaged with hooks, spines or wings; seeds occasionally some- what winged, the embryo straight, the endosperm thin.
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Habit
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herbs
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Note
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The Pedaliaceae is closely allied to the Martyniaceae with which it is often united, the major distinctions being that the New World Martyniaceae has parietal placentation and woody, indehiscent fruits while the Old World Pedaliaceae has axile placentation and dehiscent fruits. These distinctions are not convincing. The Pedaliaceae (and Martyniaceae) are similar to the Scrophulariaceae, Bignoniaceae and Acanthaceae, and close alliance has been postulated with the first and last of these families. In Panama, only the genus Sesamum is known, and that from cultivated plants which escape and are perhaps naturalized. The balance of the family, which includes about 12 genera, is confined to the Old World tropics, ranging from Africa to the Philippines. Martynia and Proboscidea of the Martyniaceae have species in Mexico and further south in Central America, while Craniolaria, also Martyniaceae, has species in Venezuela and further south in South America. It would not be surprising to encounter species of these genera in Panama, for they are sometimes cultivated for their curious fruits and have been carried from place to place for ritual purposes by indigenous populations. Members of these genera are similar to the one treated here but tend to be more robust, more viscid pubescent, and they have large, woody, fruits with formidable hornlike processes which can damage cattle.
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Reference
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Bruce, E. A. 1953. Notes on African Pedaliaceae. Kew Bull. 8: 417-429. Nayar, N. M. & K. L. Mehra. 1970. Sesame: its uses, botany, cytogenetics and origin. Econ. Bot. 24: 20-31.
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