Biancaea Tod., Nuovi Gen. Sp. Orto Palermo: 21. 1860.
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https://dx.doi.org/10.3897/phytokeys.240.101716 |
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https://treatment.plazi.org/id/077A6F5F-B338-4517-B24A-CE87C243429A |
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scientific name |
Biancaea Tod., Nuovi Gen. Sp. Orto Palermo: 21. 1860. |
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Biancaea Tod., Nuovi Gen. Sp. Orto Palermo: 21. 1860. View in CoL
Figs 37 View Figure 37 , 38 View Figure 38 , 62 View Figure 62
Campecia Adans., Fam. Pl. (Adanson) 2: 318. 1763 (no type species designated, and no species names ever published in this genus. It is thus not possible to apply this name which is rejected against Biancaea ).
Caesalpinia sect. Sappania DC., Prodr. [A. P. de Candolle] 2: 484. 1825. Type not designated.
Type.
Biancaea scandens Tod. [= Biancaea decapetala (Roth) Deg.]
Description.
Lianas, climbing or trailing shrubs or small trees, armed with short, slightly recurved prickles. Stipules lanceolate-oblong to broadly ovate, sometimes amplexicaul at base, caducous or persistent. Leaves bipinnate, ending with a pair of pinnae, rachis armed with pairs of prickles at the base of each pinna, sometimes also scattered on the rachis; pinnae in 4-19 opposite or alternate pairs; leaflets in 5-20 opposite or alternate pairs per pinna. Inflorescence a terminal or axillary raceme or panicle. Flowers bisexual, zygomorphic; hypanthium persisting as a small cup or wider shallow cup or occasionally as an abscised free ring around the pedicel apex as the fruit matures; sepals 5, caducous, usually pubescent, the lower sepal cucullate and covering the other 4 in bud; petals 5, free, yellow to white, eglandular, the median petal smaller than the other 4, and inrolled towards the centre; stamens 10, filaments densely pubescent especially at the base; ovary densely velutinous. Fruit a coriaceous, pubescent, glabrescent or glabrous, eglandular, dehiscent, wingless, laterally compressed (but somewhat inflated and often with a narrow wing along the upper suture in B. decaptala ), 1-9-seeded legume. Seeds flat, black, or brown.
Chromosome number.
2 n = 24 ( B. decapetala , B. sappan ) ( Kumari and Bir 1989).
Included species and geographic distribution.
Six species widespread across southern Asia. Biancaea decapetala , native to Asia, has been widely introduced across the tropics as a hedge plant or ornamental and is invasive in South Africa and Hawaii (Fig. 62 View Figure 62 ).
Ecology.
Primary forest and forest margins, grasslands, scrub vegetation, riverine habitats, secondary thickets, and clearings. From the coast to mountain slopes.
Etymology.
It is presumed that the Italian botanist Agostino Todaro (1818-1892) named Biancaea for his fellow countryman and botanist Giuseppe Bianca (1801-1883).
Human uses.
Biancaea decapetala often grown as a living fence ( Hattink 1974).
Notes.
Gagnon and Lewis in Gagnon et al. (2016) re-established and emended the description of the genus. A new species, Biancaea scabrida L.M. Choo, was published in 2021 ( Choo 2021).
Taxonomic references.
Brummitt et al. (2007); Chen et al. (2010a); Gagnon et al. (2016); Hattink (1974); Jansen (2005); Molinari-Novoa et al. (2016b); Vidal and Hul Thol (1976).
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