Marchantia
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Authority
Britton, Nathaniel L. & Millspaugh, Charles F. 1920. The Bahama Flora.
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Family
Marchantiaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Description - Thallus branching dichotomously. Air-chambers with distinct boundaries, forming a single layer; green cells in short, simple or branched filaments rising from the floors of the chambers., the filaments mostly three or four cells long; epidermal pores bounded by several superimposed layers, each usually composed of four cells. Ventral scales variable, some divided into a basal portion and an appendage. Inflorescence dioecious. Antheridial receptacle terminal on a thallus-braneh, flat or slightly convex, more or less lobed, borne on a somewhat elongated stalk with two rhizoid-furrows. Carpocephalum arising from the extremity of a thallus-braneh, composed of a flat or convex central portion from which four to ten rays spread out, often unsymmetrically, the rays terete or flat; stalk with two or four rhizoid-furrows; archegonia (and sporophytes) in radiating groups between the lobes, each group enclosed by a membranous involucre consisting of two folds with fringed margins; pseudoperianth (around each sporophyte) tubular, membranous, with an open, irregularly cleft mouth. Capsule without a lid, splitting into from four to eight irregular teeth; cells of wall with ring-like thickenings. Gemmae discoid, several cells thick in the middle and with the growing points, borne in circular, cup-like conceptacles. [In honor of Nicholas Marchant, director of the ducal garden at Blois, died 1678.] About fifty species, mostly tropical. Type species: Marchantia polymorpha L.