Campomanesia
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Authority
Landrum, Leslie R. 1986. Campomanesia, Pimenta, Blepharocalyx, Legrandia, Acca, Myrrhinium, and Luma (Myrtaceae). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 45: 1-178. (Published by NYBG Press)
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Family
Myrtaceae
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Scientific Name
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Type
Type. Campomanesia lineatifolia Ruiz & Pavon.
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Synonyms
Abbevillea O.Berg, Acrandra, Britoa, Lacerdaea, Paivaea, Campomanesia
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Description
Genus Description - Shrubs less than 1 m high to trees up to ca. 15 m high; hairs whitish, yellowish, or light reddish-brown, unicellular, simple, up to ca. 1 mm long. Leaves persistent or caducous in less than one year, membranous to stiffly coriaceous, the venation usually brochidodromous with broadly arching lateral veins, a marginal vein not clearly differentiated, small pits and/or tufts of hairs often present in the axils of the main lateral veins beneath. Inflorescence a solitary flower or a dichasium of usually no more than three flowers, the peduncles subtended by leaves or reduced bracts, sometimes aggregated on short bracteate shoots. Flowers pentamerous (rarely tetramerous), the calyx open or the lobes fused together in a hypanthial tube beyond the ovary, the hypanthium then tearing between the lobes at anthesis, or the calyx completely closed in the bud and tearing irregularly at anthesis into two or three pieces that fall cleanly from the ovary after anthesis; bracteoles linear, narrowly elliptic, or lanceolate, usually deciduous at or before anthesis; stamens ca. 60-700, whitish, folded centerward in the closed bud, the filaments much longer than the anthers in the young bud, not stiff in the mature flower; petals whitish, suborbicular or obovate, 3-30 mm long; ovary (3-)4-18-locular, the locular wall becoming a strongly glandular, submembranous to slightly woody tissue in the mature fruit that serves as a false seed coat; ovules 4-20 per locule, normally arranged in two longitudinal rows, normally all or all but one aborting per locule. Fruit a globose or ovoid-rhomboidal berry up to ca. 7.5 cm long or wide. Seeds normally 0-1 per locule, often about 1-4 per fruit, the seed coat a thin membrane, often not detectable in the mature fruit. Embryo coiled, the hypocotyl thickened, the cotyledons relatively small. Berg's genera Abbevillea, Acrandra, Britoa, Lacerdaea, and Paivaea have received varying degrees of acceptance. Berg himself realized that Lacerdaea did not differ from Britoa (Linnaea 30: 713. 1861). According to Berg’s keys to the Pimentoideae (=Myrtinae) (Linnaea 27:347-349.1856; in Martius, Fl. bras. 14(1): 382. 1857), Britoa differs from Campomanesia in having the calyx more or less closed; Acrandra in having attenuate, basifixed anthers; and Abbevillea in having dish-shaped, widely spreading calyx. The monotypic Paivaea, which did not appear in any key, has a distinctive horizontal warty ridge encircling the hypanthium; this is most evident in flowering specimens. Berg described the same species as Abbevillea phaea from a fruiting specimen. Various authors have given some of Berg’s genera subgeneric status within Campomanesia. In my opinion there are no useful subgeneric divisions that can be made in Campomanesia. An argument might be made for recognizing Britoa, Acrandra, or Paivaea as monotypic genera, because the types of each are distinctive species. But if all are united with Campomanesia, as I have done here, Campomanesia becomes one of the most well-defined genera of the Myrtaceae, which I believe is a desirable result.