Tabernaemontana

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Tabernaemontana

Description

Shrubs or small trees; Branchlets glabrous or sparsely pubescent. Leaves opposite, often a pair unequal in size, rarely in whorls of 3; Inflorescence a cyme or solitary flower, lax; Sepals with or without colleters inside. Stamens subsessile or with short filaments; Fruit of paired follicles, sometimes connate by their bases; Seeds covered in a fleshy aril.

Distribution

Asia-Tropical, throughout the Old and New World tropics present
Approximately 100 speciesthroughout the Old and New World tropics; in Malesia 13 species.

Taxonomy

1 There remains some debate as to whether Tabernaemontana is monophyletic. In particular it is possible that the New World species of Tabernaemontana are more closely related to some of the genera that have not been synonymised into Tabernaemontana than they are to the Old World species of Tabernaemontana (Mary Endress, pers. com.). This may eventually lead to the genus being made larger to accommodate these other genera or to the splitting up of the genus into smaller monophyletic genera. 2 Species delimitation is rather difficult in Tabernaemontana and there has been some debate as to whether the broad species concepts adopted by Leeuwenberg (1991) should be followed. This is particularly true for T. pandacaqui which has an extremely extensive synonymy. The account here is largely adapted from Leeuwenberg (1991) rather than having been completely reworked. I have not listed all the synonyms for each species and the reader is referred back to Leeuwenberg.

Citation

L. 1999 – In: Fl. Thailand: 27
Blanco 1837: Fl. Filip.: 114
Pit. 1933 – In: Lecomte, Fl. Indo-Chine 3: 1142
Kessler & Sidiy. 1994: Trees Balikpapan-Samarinda: 54
D.J. Middleton 2004 – In: Tree Fl. Sabah & Sarawak: 50
L. 2001 – In: PROSEA: 530
Leeuwenb. 1988 – In: Agric. Univ. Wageningen Pap.: 1
P.S. Ashton 1988 – In: Man. non-Dipt. Trees Sarawak: 41
Ridl. 1923 – In: Fl. Malay Penins.: 340
Beaman et al. 2001 – In: Pl. Mt. Kinabalu: 111
J.A.R. Anderson 1980: Checklist Trees Sarawak: 149
D.J. Middleton 1997 – In: Argent et al., Man. non-Dipterocarp Trees C. Kalimantan 1: 83
L. 1994 – In: Rev. Tabernaemontana: 213
Cockburn 1976 – In: Trees Sabah: 13
Backer & Bakh.f. 1965 – In: Fl. Java: 228
Leeuwenb. 1984 – In: J. Ethno-pharmacol.: 1
Whitmore 1973 – In: Tree Fl. Malaya: 21
L. 1991 – In: Rev. Tabernaemontana: 1
R.Br. 1810: Prodr.: 467
L. 1996 – In: Coode et al. (eds.), Checklist Pl. Brunei: 28
L. 1990 – In: Baas et al., Pl. Divers. Malesia: 73
King & Gamble 1907 – In: J. Asiat. Soc. Bengal: 447
Corner 1988 – In: Wayside Trees Malaya, ed. 3: 159