Santolina rosmarinifolia, Mill. (Miller, 1768

Rivero-Guerra, Aixa O., 2013, Evaluation of Linnaeus’ concept of Santolina rosmarinifolia L. (Asteraceae, Anthemideae) and its interpretation, Adansonia (3) 35 (1), pp. 87-105 : 94

1. Santolina rosmarinifolia L. subsp. rosmarinifolia

Species Plantarum II: 842 (1753) . — Type (as given in the protologue): “Habitat in Hispania”. — Lecto-, (designated by Humphries in Jarvis & Turland in Taxon 47: 365. 1998): “2 rosmarinifolia ” (handwritten graphite notation in the centre of the lower margin), and “985.2” (graphite notation in the centre of the upper margin). (Herb. Linn. n° 985.2 [LINN: http://www.linneanonline.org/9989]).

REMARKS

Three specimens are potentially original material of S. rosmarinifolia: LINN 985.2, BM- CLIFF 000646963 (see Appendix) and L 0053126 ( Fig. 1 ). The lectotype is quite typical and annoted with “ rosmarinifolia ” by Linnaeus ( LINN 985.2 ). It is a sample with three sterile stems and two flowering stems with one and two axillary branches respectively, all of them with immature heads .

Stearn (1957) explained the connection between the number on the sheets of the Linnean herbarium and the number that Linnaeus used for each species in the first edition of Species Plantarum. He suggested that the presence of these numbers is indicative that the collection was in Linnaeus’ possession prior to 1753. The specimen of S. rosmarinifolia from Linnaeus’ herbarium, particularly, shows that the two numbers match.

The specimens from Cliffort’s herbarium (BM- CLIFF 000646963) were used by Linnaeus to prepare Hortus Cliffortianus in 1738. Linnaeus spent the winter of 1737-1738 in the Botanical Garden of Leiden, invited by van Royen, the director of this institution, assisting in preparing a new system for the arrangement of the Hortus ( Jarvis 2007). Probably, he also examined van Royen’s collection prior to 1753. Therefore, these two collections are also original material of this species.

Figures

FIG. 1. — Specimen of S. rosmarinifolia L. (L 0053126) preserved in the herbarium of A. van Royen.