Platycarpha | |
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Scientific classification ![]() | |
Kingdom: | Plantae |
Clade: | Tracheophytes |
Clade: | Angiosperms |
Clade: | Eudicots |
Clade: | Asterids |
Order: | Asterales |
Family: | Asteraceae |
Tribe: | Platycarpheae |
Genus: | Platycarpha Less. |
Species: | P. glomerata |
Binomial name | |
Platycarpha glomerata (Thunb.) Less. | |
Synonyms [1] | |
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Platycarpha is a genus of South African plants within the family Asteraceae. [2] [3] It contains a single species, Platycarpha glomerata, which is native to the Cape Provinces and KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa.
The name Platycarpha is derived from two Greek words, platys "broad" and karphos "a chip of straw or wood, a scale, a dry stalk". [4] The name was first used by Christian Friedrich Lessing in 1831. [5] The type species is Platycarpha glomerata. [6] This species had been named Cynara glomerata by Carl Peter Thunberg in 1800, [7] and was moved to Platycarpha by A.P. de Candolle in 1836 in Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis . [8]
The genus formerly contained three species. Studies suggested splitting Platycarpha into two genera, Platycarpha and Platycarphella , with two species placed in Platycarphella. [9] [10] [11] The systematic position of Platycarpha has long been regarded with uncertainty. Most authors have placed it in the tribe Arctotideae [10] until molecular phylogenetic studies showed it to be closer to Vernonieae. [12] In 2009, the new tribe Platycarpheae was established for Platycarpha and Platycarphella. [13]