Barleria cuspidata Nees (1832: 93)

Patil, Suraj S., Deshmukh, Pradip V. & Lekhak, Manoj M., 2022, Typification of some names in Indian Barleria L. (Acanthaceae), Phytotaxa 547 (3), pp. 285-294 : 285-287

Barleria cuspidata Nees (1832: 93)

Type (lectotype designated here):— INDIA. s.d., Wallich Cat. no. 2499b, Herb. Heyne (K barcode K000797773!). Fig. 1 . Residual syntypes:—Wallich Cat. no. 2499a (GZU barcode GZU000251701!, K001116219!); 2499b (GZU barcode GZU000251699!; K, barcode K001116217!); 2499c (GZU barcode GZU000251537!; K, barcode K001116218!); 2496c (GZU barcode GZU000251698!; K barcode K000797771—72!) .

Notes: Nees (1832) validated Barleria cuspidata based on three gatherings listed under this name (“Herb. Madr., Herb. Heyn. et Herb. Wight. Wall. Cat. n. 2499a, b, c”) in Wallich’s Catalogue (1830a: 75), one distributed as ‘ B. mucronata ’ from Wight’s herbarium (“Wight Herb. propr. n. 16”), and another as “ B. noctiflora Hb. Heyn. ” from Wallich’s Catalogue (“n. 2496c”). Nees also indicated two localities: “in aridis Indiae or., prope Tanschaur (Tanjore), (Linn.)” and “In collibus provinciae Madurae, Dindygul etc. (Wight)”. The first appears to be a reference to what is cited (“aridis Tanschaur. König”) in the protologue of B. noctiflora L.f. (1782: 290), which Nees (1832) treated as a distinct species without citing this locality, so it is unclear to what Nees may have been referring. None of the specimens involved was indicated as a type. Therefore, the specimens 2499a, b and c and the other two specimens constitute syntypes. Shendage & Yadav (2010: 111) indicated “Wall., Numer. List No. 2499 (Photo!, K)” as “Type”, but this is not a single gathering (Art. 9.17 of the ICN) nor did they use the term “here designated” (Art. 7.11 of the ICN) or an equivalent, so this was not an acceptable lectotypification.

While searching for the relevant type we found several sheets associated with Barleria cuspidata . At the Graz herbarium (GZU), where Nees’s Acanthaceae specimens now reside ( Stafleu & Cowan 1981: 706), we found five sheets, viz. 2499a (GZU000251701) annotated with ‘Herb. Madr.’, 2499b (GZU000251699) with ‘Herb. Heyn.’, 2499c (GZU000251537) with ‘Herb. Wight.’, 2496c (GZU000251698) with ‘ Barleria noctiflora Herb. Heyn / ad partem’, and Herb. Wight propr. 16 (GZU000249396) with “ Barleria mucronata ”. The specimen number 16 distributed by Wight, according to Wight & Arnott (1934: 4), was actually a species of Ranunculus , prompting Nees (1847: 239) to later indicate this as “Wight h. propr. n. 1963”.

At the Kew herbarium (K) we found six specimens pasted on two sheets (three each on a sheet). The first sheet bears a cut-out label from Wallich’s Catalogue “2499 Barleria cuspidata Hb. Madr. / B. Hb. Heyn. / C. Hb. Wight” and various plant fragments labelled with pencil “a” (K001116219), “b” (K001116217) and “c” (K001116218) whereas the second sheet comprises three specimens K000797771, K000797772 and K000797773, of which K000797773 is annotated as ‘2499b / Hb. Heyne’. The specimen K000797771 is annotated ‘Herb. Madr.’ and is without collection number whereas K000797772 bears the label ‘Herb. Wight. propr. 1963’. Five of these specimens, excepting K000797771, appear to be duplicates of specimens Nees possessed in his herbarium and would be original material for his name. From among the original material indicated above we select the specimen 2499b (K000797773) as the lectotype, it is well preserved and matches well with the protologue.

Figures

FIGURE 1. Lectotype of Barleria cuspidata (K000797773) [Reproduced with kind permission of the Board of Trustees, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.].