? Hypericum chinense
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Taxonomy
This name predates H. chinense L. (1759), as MERRILL () pointed out. MERRILL, however, thought that LINNAEUS and OSBECK had described the same species, whereas OSBECK'S description is of a herb with quadrangular stems, and therefore his name cannot be applied to the Linnaean species. If H. chinense OSBECK is a Hypericum, as seems likely, then it is almost certainly an earlier name for H. japonicum THUNB. ex MURRAY. In the absence of a specimen, however, and in the interest of nomenclatural stability, it should be regarded as a nomen dubium.