Annual herbs or perennial shrublets, grey-tomentose with branched and sometimes glandular hairs
Leaves entire, sinuate-dentate or pinnatifid
Inflorescences terminal, lax racemes
Sepals erect, 2 inner ones saccate at base
Petals long-clawed, pink-purple, white or brownish yellow
Stamens 6; long filaments sometimes dilated, without appendages
Nectaries 4, semicircular, one on either side of each short filament
Fruit a siliqua on short, stout pedicels, linear, terete; valves 1-nerved, hairy; style very short or absent; stigma 2-lobed, lobes erect, each with dorsal swelling or horn
Seeds in one row, compressed, often winged; cotyledons accumbent
x = 6, 7 (aneuploids)
Nomenclature:
*Matthiola R.Br.
Brown: 119 (1812) name conserved
Sonder: 20 (1860)
Schulz: 562 (1936)
Adamson: 424 (1950)
Phillips: 353 (1951)
Ball: 279 (1964)
Schreiber: P48:9-5 (1966)
Marais: 109 (1970)
Jonsell: 62 (1982)
Jonsell: 72 (1993)
Distribution & Notes:
Global: Species 55, Macaronesia, western Europe, Mediterranean
Southern Africa: Species 3, recorded in the drier parts as introduced species and garden escapes: Namibia, North-West, Free State, Lesotho, Northern, Western and Eastern Cape
References:
ADAMSON, R.S. 1950. Cruciferae Juss. In R.S. Adamson & T.M. Salter, Flora of the Cape Peninsula. Juta, Cape Town
BROWN, R. 1812. In W. Aiton, Hortus kewensis, edn 2, 4. George Nicol, London
JONSELL, B. 1982. Cruciferae. Flora of tropical East Africa, Cruciferae
JONSELL, B. 1993. Brassicaceae (Cruciferae). Flora of Somalia 1
MARAIS, W. 1970. Cruciferae. Flora of southern Africa 13
PHILLIPS, E.P. 1951. The genera of South African flowering plants, edn 2. Memoirs of the Botanical Survey of South Africa No. 25
SCHREIBER, A. 1966. Brassicaceae. Prodromus einer Flora von Südwestafrika 48
SCHULZ, O.E. 1936. Cruciferae. Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien II,17b
SONDER, O.W. 1860. Crucifereae. Flora capensis 1
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Biodiversity Advisor, developed by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) and its Data Partners, is a system that will provide integrated biodiversity information to a wide range of users who will have access to geospatial data, plant and animal species distribution data, ecosystem-level data, literature, images and metadata.
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