Petitia

• Authority

  Britton, Nathaniel L. & Millspaugh, Charles F. 1920. The Bahama Flora.

• Family

  Verbenaceae

• Scientific Name

  Petitia

• Description

  Description - Trees or shrubs, with large opposite entire petioled tomentulose leaves, and small axillary cymose-paniculate flowers. Calyx eampanulate, 4-toothed or subtruncate. Corolla short-salverform, the limb spreading, 4-cleft, the lobes imbricated. Stamens 4, borne near the top of the corolla-tube, equal; filaments very short; anthers ovate. Ovary 2-celled; ovules 2 in each cavity; style 2-eleft at the apex. Fruit a small drupe, the endocarp 2-4-celled. [Commemorates Francois Petit, 1664-1741, a French physician.] Two or three species of the West Indies and Mexico, the following typical.