Hypericum maculatum subsp. immaculatum (Nomenclature)
Stems always with complete subsidiary lines. Leaves with densely reticulate tertiary venation; laminar gland dots pale, usually ± dense, occasionally with a few black. Inflorescence branches narrowly ascending, making an angle of c. 30° with stem. Flowers 15-35 mm in diam. Sepals broadly ovate, rounded to obtuse or somewhat acute, entire or minutely denticulate; laminar glands pale, striiform and punctiform. Petals entire, without or rarely with 1-3 black marginal glands; laminar glands pale, linear to striiform. Styles equalling ovary.
2n = 16?
Subalpine meadows; (500-)1000-c. 2200 m.
Southern Romania (Carpathians), western and southern Bulgaria, northern Greece, Makhedonia, southern Serbia, Bosnia, Montenegro, northern Albania.
Of the two diploid subspecies of H. maculatum, subsp. immaculatum would seem to be the more primitive and to constitute a relict Balkan population that has given rise to both subsp.. maculatum and (by autotetraploidy) to subsp. obtusiusculum. It is also the nearest taxon morphologically to the H. tetrapterum group (Spp. 2-4) and would appear to be one parent of the allotetraploid 5. H. perforatum. The linear pale petal glands and usually glandular-punctate leaves both lead to the above conclusions, as do the punctate leaves and linear to striiform petal glands in H. perforatum (q.v.). A sheet from Greece (Makhedonia, Drama, Mt. Falakron, Stamatiadou 10131 (C)), with one plant with characters of subsp. maculatum among four plants of subsp. immaculatum, may indicate an independent development of punctate black laminar glands in the sepals and petals.