Hypericum androsaemum (Nomenclature)
Shrub 0-3-0-7 m tall, bushy with numerous stems from branching but not rooting base, with branches erect. Stems 2-lined when young, eventually terete; internodes 3-9 mm long, shorter than to exceeding leaves; bark fissured or scaling. Leaves sessile, sometimes amplexicaul, without goat-like smell when crushed; lamina (25-)40-120(-150) x 20-80 mm, oblong-ovate or triangular-ovate to broadly ovate, rounded or rarely obtuse, margin plane, base truncate to cordate, paler beneath, not glaucous, papyraceous; venation: 4-5 pairs of ascending main lateral veins, with tertiary reticulum ± prominent on both sides; laminar glands small; intramarginal glands dense. Inflorescence 1-11-flowered, from 1-2 nodes with ± condensed internode, corymbose to pseudo-umbellate with branches ± narrowly ascending, without accessory flowers, sometimes with 1-3-flowered branches from node below; pedicels 8-14 mm long; bracts reduced, linear-lanceolate to subulate. Flowers 15- 25 mm in diam.; buds globose, rounded. Sepals 6-12(-15) x 3-7 mm, imbricate, markedly unequal, spreading to deflexed and enlarging after anthesis, deflexed and persistent in fruit, oblong-ovate to broadly ovate, rounded, 7-9(-ll)-veined from base with veins ± densely reticulate; laminar glands punctiform or occasionally striiform; intramarginal glands rather dense. Petals golden yellow, not tinged red, incurved, 6-10(-12) x 3-7 mm, equalling or slightly shorter than sepals, obovate, without apiculus. Stamen fascicles each with 20-25(-30) stamens, longest 7-11 mm long, c. 0.9-1.1 x petals. Ovary 4-5 x 3.5-4.5(-5) mm, ellipsoid-subglobose, rounded to truncate; styles 2-2.5 mm long, c. 0.5 x ovary, erect, the upper half sharply outcurved; stigmas subcapitate. 'Capsule' 7-12 x 6-8 mm, broadly cylindric- ovoid or cylindric-ellipsoid to globose, rounded to retuse, thin-walled and fleshy, maturing from reddish to dark reddish-brown or purplish-black, lucent, indehiscent (but sometimes splitting in three if compressed laterally when dry). Seeds reddish- brown, c. 1 mm long, partially or rarely completely unilaterally winged, without terminal winged appendages.
2n = 40.
In damp or shaded places, lowland to 1800 m (in Iran).
British Isles (widespread, but absent from NE. [except for naturalised plants], extreme N., Outer Hebrides, and northern islands), Belgium (Ardennes), France (W., also scattered in E. and S. - Oise, Cher, Isere, Aveyron, etc.), Spain (N.), Portugal (N., south to Cintra), Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Sicily (W.), Sardinia, Corsica (extinct ?), Italy (NW. south to Toscana, Elba ?, SE. - Ischia, Napoli ?, Basilicata, also elsewhere but possibly naturalised). Yugoslavia (N.: Pula, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia), Bulgaria (SE.), Turkey (Thrace, Pontus, Amanus), U.S.S.R. (Georgia, Azerbaijan, Daghestan, Turkmenistan), Iran (N.: Azerbaijan, Gilan, Mazanderan, Gorgan). Introduced into Australia, New Zealand (North, South, Stewart, and Campbell Islands), and Chile.
H. androsaemum can be distinguished from both H. foliosum and H. x inodorum (H. androsaemum x hircinum) by the short styles, the black or dark red-brown baccate fruit, and the petals, which are equal to or shorter than the sepals. The shiny berry is easily detachable from the receptacle and is eaten (and the seeds are dispersed) by birds. If not eaten, after about a month it dries and withers on the plant ; but it can be split into three valves by slight pressure, and may do so spontaneously after over-wintering. The larger-flowered forms of H. androsaemum tend to have red-tinged leaves and sepals and larger, cylindric-ovoid fruits that become brownish-red early and ripen to dark reddish-brown; whereas those with smaller flowers tend to have green leaves and sepals and smaller, cylindric-ellipsoid to globose fruits that ripen later to a bright red before becoming shiny black. These forms, however, appear to be linked by a continuous series of intermediates. In addition, a form with yellow-green leaves (var. aureum hort.) is sometimes seen in cultivation; and a form with variegated leaves has been found in two gardens in Ireland, having been collected originally at Lisnavagh in Co. Carlow (D. McClintock, pers. comm.; cult. spec. in BM). This form also occurred as a seedling at the Hillier Nursery, Winchester, Hampshire.
The selection of a lectotype of H. androsaemum L. is not as simple as it appeared to me to be earlier, when I cited 'Cult. in horto Upsaliensis' in Fl. Iranica, Guttiferae: 5 (1968). Linnaeus first cites Hortus upsaliensis, in which the phrase-name has been changed from that in Hort. Cliff., 'caule fruticoso ancipiti' having been substituted for the earlier 'foliis ovatis pedunculo longioribus.' He could have observed the ancipitous stems on the Herb. Cliff, specimen also, but no doubt did not happen to have noted this character at the time. Linnaeus also cites Bauhin's Pinax and Dodoens' Stirp. Hist. Pempt., finishing with 'Habitat in Angliae, Ilvae sepibus' and the sign for 'tree or shrub'. The geographical data were derived respectively from Ray and Burser (?); but the first two phrase-names are based on plants seen by Linnaeus himself. No specimen of the plant that he grew in his 'frigidarium' at Uppsala is known to exist (in London, Stockholm, Uppsala, Helsinki, or Moscow); but there is a specimen in Herb. Cliff. (BM). The one in Herb. Linn. (LINN 943.12), of which the provenance is unknown, is not H. androsaemum but H. x inodorum Miller. I therefore select the Herb. Cliff, specimen (p. 380, No. 4), an authentic specimen seen by Linnaeus, as the lectotype of H.androsaemum.