Hypericum montanum (Nomenclature)
Perennial herb 0.2-0.8 m tall, wholly erect or decumbent to ascending but not rooting at base, with woody taproot, few-stemmed, usually unbranched below inflorescence, wholly glabrous often except leaves beneath. Stems green to reddish, terete; internodes all or upper exceeding leaves. Leaves sessile; lamina (20-)25-70 x (10-)13-28 mm, oblong-elliptic to lanceolate or broadly ovate, paler beneath, thinly chartaceous, not glaucous, wholly glabrous or usually scabrid to puberulous beneath, plane, spreading; apex obtuse to rounded or uppermost subacute, margin entire, base rounded to truncate or subcordate; venation: 3-4 pairs of laterals curved-ascending from lower 0.2-0.25 of midrib; tertiary reticulation dense, not or slightly prominent; laminar glands pale, dense, unequal, not prominent, rarely absent ('var. caucasicum'); intramarginal glands black, dense but irregular, the larger often submarginal. Inflorescence 7-32(-c. 50)-flowered from up to 3(4) nodes, without flowering branches from lower nodes, curved-pyramidal or corymbiform to subcapitate and dense, or lower node(s) distant with dense partial inflorescences, the whole then narrowly pyramidal to narrowly cylindric; pedicels 1.5-4 mm; bracts and bracteoles linear, black- glandular-ciliate, densely glandular-auriculate. Flowers 10-15(-20) mm in diam.; buds narrowly ellipsoid to cylindric, rounded. Sepals 5-6 x 1-1.5 mm, subequal or equal, free or very shortly united, narrowly oblong to narrowly lanceolate, acute, with margin rather long-glandular-ciliate; veins 5, laterals branching; laminar glands pale, linear to striiform; marginal glands black, flat-topped. Petals pale yellow, not tinged red, (8-)10- 12 x 2-3.5 mm, c. 2 x sepals, oblong-lanceolate, rounded, apiculus absent; laminar glands pale, few, elongate-punctiform or usually absent; marginal glands absent. Stamens 20-28, longest 6-9 mm, c. 0.75 x petals; anther gland black. Ovary 2.5-3.5 x 1.5-2.5 mm, narrowly to rather broadly ovoid; styles 3-4 mm, 1.2-1.35 x ovary, spreading. Capsule 6-8 x 4-6 mm, ovoid, exceeding sepals, enclosed when developing by petals twisting together. Seeds dark red-brown, 0.8 mm long; testa linear-reticulate.
2n=16 (Noack, 1939; Robson, 1956; Reynaud, 1975; Löve & Löve, 1982), n = 8 (Nielsen, 1924; Gagnieu & Wilhelm, 1965).
Woods, thickets and hedgebanks, on calcareous or gravelly soils; lowland (especially in the north) to 1200 m (Italy), 1450 m (Spain) and 1950 m (Morocco).
From northern England, Denmark, southern Norway, and southern Sweden, southern Finland (one locality), Estonia (one locality), Poland, Belarus and the Ukraine (including Krym), south to N. Portugal, central Spain, Corsica, Sardinia, Italy, Bosnia, Serbia and Romania; also Georgia, NE Turkey and Morocco.
H. montanum is the north-western member of a pair of species that appears to be directly related to H. reflexum (from the Canary Islands), the other member being H. annulatum. H. montanum is mainly west, central and east European and north-west African; H. annulatum is mainly south-east European and north-east to east African.
H. montanum can be separated from H. annulatum only on a combination of characters, since the latter in particular is very variable. H. montanum is always glabrous except on the lower leaf-surface, which is usually scabrid. Where that, too, is glabrous (var. typicum G. Beck), the species can nearly always be distinguished from wholly glabrous forms of H. annulatum by the condensed inflorescence or partial inflorescences. In most cases, however, H. annulatum can be recognised by the presence of hairs on the stem and upper leaf-surface and the relatively lax inflorescence.
H. montanum is not very variable other than in leaf shape, the indumentum of the lower leaf-surface and the presence or absence of partial inflorescences. The scabrid lower surface of the leaf (var. scabrum Koch, var. scaberulum G. Beck) is by far the commoner state, although Beck named the wholly glabrous form var. typicum. The lectotype, too, is scabrid beneath, and so var. typicum is not the type variety, i.e. var. montanum. In fact, the glabrous leaf seems to be no more than a shade-induced state that does not merit taxonomic recognition.
In Georgia and Turkey most of the populations have leaves without laminar pale glands (var. caucasicum Boiss.); but this character is not wholly constant, and so I have not given these populations taxonomic recognition either.
Finally, H. montanum var. pilosum Horwood is H. hirsutum L., whilst var. maculantherum Sagorsky and var. punctatum Andreanszky are almost certainly respectively H. spruneri Boiss. and H. perfoliatum L., although I have not yet managed to see the type of either variety. The record of H. montanum from southern Greece (Messinia) (Sibthorp & Smith, Fl. Graecae Prodr. 2: 117, 1813) possibly refers to H. vesiculosum Griseb. (sect. 13. Drosocarpium), which occurs there.
Although Linnaeus's protologue includes references to Bauhin's Pinax and Historia, Columna's Ekphrasis and Fuch's Historia, the absence of this plant from the first edition of Species plantarum (1753) suggests that either Linnaeus had not seen material of it by that date or (more likely) that he had overlooked it. From the relatively full treatment of H. montanum in both Fl. suecica 2nd ed. and Species plantarum 2nd ed., however, it would seem that by 1755 he had obtained such material. The only specimen of this species in the Linnaean Herbarium (LINN) is unannotated, apart from the name; but there seems little doubt that it is one of the specimens mentioned in Fl. suecica. It is therefore the most appropriate lectotype.