Hypericum venustum (Nomenclature)
Perennial herb, 0.25–0.75 m tall, glabrous, erect from creeping and rooting base, branching at all nodes but only after flowering. Stems 2-lined, with occasional red glands, especially on lines, not prominent; internodes 15–60 mm, exceeding leaves. Leaves sessile, not glaucous; lamina 13–32 × 6–17 mm, ovate to elliptic-ovate, concolorous, chartaceous, apex rounded, margin, plane, base truncate to cordate-amplexicaul, with 3 pairs of lateral veins basal and from lower ¼ of midrib; laminar glands small, some slightly elongate, rather dense, without apical black gland; intramarginal glands pale, spaced. Inflorescence ∞-flowered, from (2)3–5 nodes, cylindric or interrupted spicate to narrowly pyramidal, wholly or partly dense, 30–145 mm long, with lateral cymules (1)3–5-flowered, without or very rarely with one pair of flowering branches below; bracts and bracteoles ovate, entire to glandular-ciliate. Flowers 20–25 mm in diam., petals erect after flowering; buds ellipsoid. Sepals equal to subequal, free, not imbricate, 4–6 × 1.5–2 mm, narrowly oblong to narrowly elliptic, acute to obtuse; veins 5, slightly prominent; margin with obconic black glands on cilia; laminar glands pale, linear or interrupted-striiform. Petals pale yellow, tinged red, (8–)10–14 × 3.3–6 mm, c. 2.5 × sepals, oblong-lanceolate; marginal glands absent; laminar glands pale, linear to striiform. Stamens c. 20–22, longest c. 8–10 mm, filaments yellow, not red-tinged; anthers yellow. Ovary 2 × 1.5 mm, ovoid-pyramidal; styles 5– 5.5 mm, c.. 2.5 × ovary. Capsule 5–6 × 4 mm, narrowly ovoid-ellipsoid. Seeds minutely rugulose (fide Stefanoff, 1932, 1933).
Marshy ground and beside streams; 1100–2850 m.
Lebanon, Turkey (except south-west and semidesert south), southern Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan (Nakhchivan).
Hypericum venustum, together with 2. H. pulchrum and 4. H. hirsutum, forms a distinct group that has some of the most primitive characters of Sect. Taeniocarpium. Thus, the leaves are broad and chartaceous in Species 1 and 4; and, while those H. pulchrum are somewhat thicker, that species is clearly derived from H. venustum. There is a westward trend in general morphology in the latter, so that some plants from extreme north-west Turkey approach the larger forms of H. pulchrum in the Iberian Peninsula. On the other hand, some eastern Anatolian forms approach H. hirsutum, which differs essentially from it in having a hirsute indumentum and sometimes petiolate leaves. All three species, however, are advanced in having relatively small narrow sepals with a gland-fringed margin, in contrast to the more primitive species in the other major clade into which the Section divides (9. H. pseudorepens and 10. H. linarioides), which have or include some forms with broader entire sepals.