Subfamily

VII. Subfam. Nepetoideae (Dumort.) Luerss. (1882).

VII. 3. Tribe Ocimeae Dumort. (1829).

VII. 3. D. Subtribe Ociminae (Dumort.) Schmidt in Martius (1858).

Subtribe Moschominae Endlicher (1838).

Description

Shrubs or herbs, sometimes geoxylic, aromatic; leaves simple; inflorescence thyrsoid with cymes sessile, 1-7-flowered; bracts persistent, smaller than leaves, often inconspicuous, not coloured; calyx tubular, tubular-campanulate or spherical, straight, actinomorphic with deltoid to lanceolate lobes in one species, otherwise strongly 2-lipped, 5-lobed (1/4), lobes unequal, posterior rounded (rarely much expanded, membranous and developing coiled side-lobes), decurrent, curving upwards; lateral teeth lanceolate or deltoid, sometimes linear with a truncate or rounded apex, anterior lobes lanceolate to linear, teeth sometimes closing throat, throat sometimes densely hairy, rarely fruiting calyx deciduous as a dispersal unit; corolla 2-lipped or very weakly so, 4-5-lobed, white, pink or blue, posterior lip forward pointing or spreading, 3-lobed with median lobe emarginate, rarely equally 4-lobed, anterior lip horizontal or more rarely spreading, tube straight or slightly curved, dilating slightly towards throat; stamens 4, included or shortly exserted, porrect; posterior and anterior pairs regularly spaced and attached near corolla throat, short, pilose or glabrous; style forming a small shield above nutlets, capitate-clavate at apex; stigma lobes rounded, equal or with the posterior lobe longer, parallel; disc equally 4-lobed; nutlets obovoid to oblong-cylindrical, sometimes truncate and pubescent at apex, strongly or weakly mucilaginous.  2n = 36.  Nineteen species in tropical and Southern Africa, one in India and Madagascar.  Woodland or grassland.

Distribution

Native to:

Synonyms

Pseudocimum Bremek., Ann. Transvaal Mus. 15: 251 (1933).

Puntia Hedge, Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinburgh 41: 115 (1983).

Publication

Endostemon N.E. Br. in Thistleton-Dyer, Fl. Cap. 5,1: 295 (1910); Ashby, in J. Bot. 74: 121-132 (1936), rev.; Paton, Harley, Harley, & Weeks, Kew Bull. 49: 673-716 (1994), rev.

Orthosiphon sect. Diffusi Briq. (1897).

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