e-Key v3 - Albertisia
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Interactive keys to the identification of seed plants of southern Africa using keys based on plant morphology.

Menispermaceae - Albertisia Becc.

Description :

  • Suffrutescent, twining lianas with greyish hairs
  • Leaves simple, broadly elliptic
  • Inflorescences with male flowers small, in 1-many-flowered condensed axillary cymules, solitary or 2 together, subsessile or pedunculate; female flowers axillary, usually solitary
  • Male flowers : sepals 6-12, outer 6-9 in 1 or 2 whorls, free, imbricate, bract-like, 3 innermost larger, coriaceous, valvate, connate into a fleshy corolliform tube; petals 3, 6 or 0, truncate-reniform, fleshy; stamens connate into a 15-30-locular synandrium, conical, stipitate; anthers with transverse dehiscence
  • Female flowers similar to male; staminodes 6; carpels 4-12, hairy
  • Drupe ellipsoid; exocarp echinulate; endocarp crustaceous or thinly woody, slightly wrinkled; condyle 0
  • Seed without endosperm; embryo straight; cotyledons very thick

Nomenclature:

  • Albertisia Becc.
    • Beccari: 161 (1877)
    • Prantl: 89 (1891)
    • Forman: 82 (1975)
    • Kessler: 408 (1993)
  • Epinetrum Hiern
    • Hiern: 21 (1896)
    • Diels: 95 (1910)
    • Troupin: 4 (1956)
    • Troupin: 151 (1960)
    • Troupin: 28 (1962)
    • Troupin & Gonçalves: 3 (1973)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global : Species ± 17, in tropical and subtropical Africa 12, in SE Asia 5
  • Southern Africa : Species 1: Albertisia delagoensis (N.E.Br.) Forman, N KwaZulu-Natal; on littoral sand

References:

  • BECCARI, O. 1877. Albertisia . Malesia 1. Bencini, Florence-Rome
  • DIELS, L. 1910. Menispermaceae . Das Pflanzenreich IV. 94 (Heft 46)
  • FORMAN, L.L. 1975. The tribe Triclisieae Diels in Asia, the Pacific and Australia. Kew Bulletin 30
  • HIERN, W.P. 1896. Menispermaceae . Catalogue of the African plants collected by Dr. Friedrich Welwitsch 1853-61 . Vol. 1. Longmans & Co., London
  • KESSLER, P.J.A. 1993. Menispermaceae . In K. Kubitzki, J.G. Rohwer & V. Bittrich, The families and genera of vascular plants - dicotyledons 2. Springer-Verlag, Berlin
  • PRANTL, K. 1891. Menispermaceae . Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien 3,2
  • TROUPIN, G. 1956. Flora of tropical East Africa . Menispermaceae
  • TROUPIN, G. 1960. Menispermaceae . Flora zambesiaca 1
  • TROUPIN, G. 1962. Monographie des Menispermaceae africaines. Académie Royale des Sciences d'Outre-Mer, Classe des sciences naturelles et médicales mémoires 13
  • TROUPIN, G. & GONÇALVES, M.L. 1973. Menispermaceae . Flora de Moçambique 7