taxonID	type	description	language	source
CD10F42AFFAFFFD06A94A721F11B19E2.taxon	materials_examined	Type: — TÜRKIYE. Kastamonu: PInarbaŞI District, Küre Mountains National Park, Horma Canyon, limestone rocks and cliffs, 41 ° 38 ’ N, 33 ° 08 ’ E, 690 m a. s. l., 20 May 2020, B. Tunçkol 5794 (holotype DUOF 0011340; isotype ACA 0012805). Cynanchica paphlagonica is similar to C. stricta, but differs by being a delicate, densely caespitose plant (versus ± robust, loosely caespitose), with inflorescence consisting of 1 – 2 (– 3) verticillasters (versus (1 –) 2 – 8 verticillasters), corolla pale yellow (versus pink, greenish- or brownish-yellow), and mericarps 1.2 – 2 mm long (versus 2 – 3 mm long). Cynanchica paphlagonica is further distinguished from all individual subspecies of C. stricta by additional morphological characters.	en	Tunçkol, Bilge, Liveri, Eleni, Koumandou, Vassiliki Lila, Aksoy, Necmi, Yaşayacak, Hasan, Trigas, Panayiotis (2025): Cynanchica paphlagonica (Rubiaceae, Rubieae), a new species from Türkiye based on morphology and phylogenetic data. Phytotaxa 704 (1): 35-48, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3, URL: https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3
CD10F42AFFAFFFD06A94A721F11B19E2.taxon	description	Description: — Delicate, densely caespitose, bright green plant with a slender woody rootstock and numerous vegetative shoots. Flowering stems numerous, slender, quadrangular, 5 – 20 cm long and 0.2 – 0.4 mm thick, erect or ascending, unbranched, sparsely minutely scabridulous at the base, glabrous above. Leaves green, filiform, 4 - whorled, 5 – 10 × 0.3 – 0.7 mm, densely clustered on vegetative shoots and at the bases of flowering stems, glabrous except the ± scabridulous basal leaves, terminate in a hyaline mucro 0.1 – 0.2 mm long, margins revolute, midrib prominent beneath, 1 / 4 – 1 / 2 as broad as leaf. Inflorescence spiciform, consisting of 1 – 2 (– 3) verticillasters, each bearing 2 – 6 sessile or shortly pedicellate flowers; bracts 1.5 – 4 mm long, linear to lanceolate, free to the base, with a narrow hyaline margin, typically forming two distinctly unequal pairs; bracteoles 1.5 – 3 mm long, lanceolate to narrowly ovate, free to the base, bordered by a narrow hyaline margin. Corolla pale yellow, hypocrateriform, 7 – 10 mm long, glabrous; lobes recurved, 1 / 3 – 1 / 4 as long as tube, oblong-lanceolate, minutely appendiculate. Ovary papillose throughout or in the distant half only. Mericarps ellipsoid, 1.2 – 2 mm long, tuberculate. Phenology: — Flowering in May, fruiting in July and August.	en	Tunçkol, Bilge, Liveri, Eleni, Koumandou, Vassiliki Lila, Aksoy, Necmi, Yaşayacak, Hasan, Trigas, Panayiotis (2025): Cynanchica paphlagonica (Rubiaceae, Rubieae), a new species from Türkiye based on morphology and phylogenetic data. Phytotaxa 704 (1): 35-48, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3, URL: https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3
CD10F42AFFAFFFD06A94A721F11B19E2.taxon	distribution	Distribution and habitat: — Cynanchica paphlagonica is currently known from a single locality in Kastamonu Province, PInarbaŞI District, Çiçekli neighbourhood, Günberi location, N Türkiye (Fig. 3). It grows in crevices of limestone cliffs and rocky slopes, accompanied by other interesting taxa, such as Allium rupestre Steven (1812: 260), Arabis caucasica Willdenow (1814: 45), Arenaria filicaulis Fenzl in Grisebach (1843: 203) subsp. filicaulis, Buxus sempervirens Linnaeus (1753: 983), Globularia cordifolia Linnaeus (1753: 96), Saxifraga rotundifolia Linnaeus (1753: 403), Scilla bithynica Boissier (1846: 111), Sideritis dichotoma Huter (1907: 360), etc.	en	Tunçkol, Bilge, Liveri, Eleni, Koumandou, Vassiliki Lila, Aksoy, Necmi, Yaşayacak, Hasan, Trigas, Panayiotis (2025): Cynanchica paphlagonica (Rubiaceae, Rubieae), a new species from Türkiye based on morphology and phylogenetic data. Phytotaxa 704 (1): 35-48, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3, URL: https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3
CD10F42AFFAFFFD06A94A721F11B19E2.taxon	etymology	Etymology: — From Paphlagonia, the ancient name of the region on the Black Sea coast of NC Anatolia that includes the present day Kastamonu Province, where the new species has been discovered. Molecular phylogenetic analysis: — The total length of the analyzed sequences was 1656 bp including 1280 conserved sites, 257 variable sites and 63 parsimony informative sites. Maximum Likelihood phylogenetic analysis revealed a poorly resolved topology, whereas Bayesian analysis resulted in a tree with better resolution. In Fig. 4 the Bayesian phylogram is shown and the branches which are also supported by ML analysis are indicated. The overall topology is in accordance with Gargiulo & al. (2015). In particular, the new species is found in a polytomy (pp = 0.99, BS = 61 %) with other six taxa: C. nitida (Smith in Sibthorp & Smith 1806: 89) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 773) subsp. nitida, C. stricta subsp. latibracteata (Boissier 1875: 35) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 775), C. stricta subsp. grandiflora (Schönb. - Tem. in Schönbeck-Temesy & Ehrendorfer 1979: 246) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 775), C. woronowii (V. I. Krecz. in Grossheim 1934: 25) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 776), C. tenuifolia (Boissier 1843: 32) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 773), and C. affinis (Boiss. & A. Huet in Boissier 1856: 110) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 770). This group comprises morphologically similar taxa endemic to Türkiye, except for C. affinis, which also occurs in Armenia (Fig. 3). The phylogeny of Cynanchica remains incompletely resolved based on the published data to date. Various ecological and biological processes, such as hybridization, have contributed to a complex mosaic of different lineages. However, reconstructing the phylogeny of Cynanchica is beyond the scope of this study. Therefore, our dataset employed a wide sampling from Cynanchica mainly from the East Mediterranean area and cpDNA regions, which were also used in previous studies to reveal the phylogenetic relationships of C. paphlagonica. The only nuclear DNA marker that was available for Cynanchica was ITS, which presented challenges due to a high number of ambiguous sites, difficulties in alignment, and ultimately resulted to insufficient phylogenetic signal. Consequently, ITS was not selected for our analyses. Additional chloroplast and nuclear regions are clearly needed to clarify the relationships within the clade to which C. paphlagonica belongs. Overall, addressing species delimitations and relationships within Cynanchica will require an integrative taxonomic approach, incorporating both morphometric and phylogenetic / phylogenomic data. Morphological comparison: — The taxonomic relationships of Cynanchica paphlagonica, based on morphological features, are largely congruent with the findings of phylogenetic analysis. It belongs to a small species group, including C. stricta, C. tenuifolia, and C. tenella (Heuff. ex Degen 1897: 196) P. Caputo & Del Guacchio in Del Guacchio & Caputo (2020: 776), characterized by acuminate to mucronate leaves with hyaline mucros up to 0.4 mm long, a large corolla up to 10 mm long with a tube 3 – 4 times longer than lobes, and flowering stems exceeding 10 cm. Cynanchica tenella, widely distributed in SE Europe and N Türkiye, is the only morphologically similar species that grows sympatrically with C. paphlagonica.	en	Tunçkol, Bilge, Liveri, Eleni, Koumandou, Vassiliki Lila, Aksoy, Necmi, Yaşayacak, Hasan, Trigas, Panayiotis (2025): Cynanchica paphlagonica (Rubiaceae, Rubieae), a new species from Türkiye based on morphology and phylogenetic data. Phytotaxa 704 (1): 35-48, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3, URL: https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3
CD10F42AFFAFFFD06A94A721F11B19E2.taxon	description	Preliminary threat assessment: — The new species is currently known only from its type locality. Over the past six years, our team has conducted intensive floristic surveys in the PInarbaŞI area, but so far no additional populations have been found. However, as the species’ habitat (calcareous rocky slopes) is widespread in the region, the possibility of undiscovered populations cannot be excluded. The single known population consists of ca. 80 individuals, occupying an area of about 2 ha (AOO = EOO = 4 km 2). No immediate threats to the population have been observed. Therefore, based on IUCN criterion D (IUCN Standards and Petitions Subcommittee 2024), we tentatively classify C. paphlagonica as Endangered (EN).	en	Tunçkol, Bilge, Liveri, Eleni, Koumandou, Vassiliki Lila, Aksoy, Necmi, Yaşayacak, Hasan, Trigas, Panayiotis (2025): Cynanchica paphlagonica (Rubiaceae, Rubieae), a new species from Türkiye based on morphology and phylogenetic data. Phytotaxa 704 (1): 35-48, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3, URL: https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.704.1.3
