Anaphyllum wightii Schott, Bonplandia, 1857

Sivadasan, M., Jaleel, V. Abdul, Boyce, P. C., Alfarhan, A. H., El-Sheikh, M. A. & Al- Obaid, S. M., 2016, Typification of names in the genus Anaphyllum (Araceae), Phytotaxa 243 (1), pp. 91-96 : 93-95

Anaphyllum wightii Schott, Bonplandia 5 (8): 127. (1857.

Lectotype (designated here): — INDIA. Peninsula Indiae Orientalis , Courtallem, September 1835, Wight 2776 ( S! S-G-8276). Fig. 2

Other specimens studied:— INDIA. Courtallem, August 1835, Wight 2776 ( CAL!, CAL0000001591 ) ; Bolimsuetty, November 1852, Wight 2776 ( K!, K000499254 ) ; “8968 Aroidea, A. Hb. Madr., B. Hb. Wight ” ( K!, K000499255 ) ; Courtallum, Wight 2776 ( GH!, GH00062327 ) ; Peninsula Indiae Orientalis. Courtallem, September 1835, Wight 2776 ( M!, M-0198865) ; Peninsula Ind. Orient., No. 2776 ( M!, M-0198866) ; Courtallum, September 1835, Peninsula Indiae Orientalis. No. 2776, Herb. Wight ( P!, P00748767 ) ; Peninsula Indiae Orientalis, Courtallem, August 1835, Wight 2776 ( C! C10006324 ) .

Note:—Name of collection locality of A. wightii is seen variously spelt as “Courtallum” and “Courtallem”. Engler (1911: 28) cited it as “Courtallam”.

The bibliographic citation of the protologue in various literatures is erroneous. Schott (1857) published Anaphyllum wightii in Bonplandia [5(8): 126(–127)]. Treating the genus in Genera Aroidearum, Schott (1858) cited “ Bonplandia 1857, p.126” referring to the first publication of the genus. The species A. wightii appeared on page 127 of Bonplandia . Hooker (1893) in Flora of British India cited “Schott Gen . Aroid. t. 83” as the place of publication of the species. Engler (1911) in his treatment of the species cited “Schott l.c. ”, a reference to “ Gen . Aroid. (1858) t. 83”. Hence in neither of the latter two publications are the bibliographic citations of the first publication of the species correct. Govaerts et al. (2015) cited “Schott, Gen .Aroid.: 83 (1858) ”. In IPNI (2015) also it was entered as “Schott, Gen . Aroid. t. 83. 1858” instead of the correct citation as “ Bonplandia 1857, p. 126”. D. H. Nicolson entered the publication details as “ Anaphyllum wightii Schott, Bonplandia 5: 126. 1857 ” on the determination slip that he affixed to the specimen at the herbarium of the Swedish Museum of Natural History, Stockholm ( S) which is designated here as the lectotype, but the page number pertains to the page where the generic name first appeared.

Schott (1857) published Anaphyllum wightii based on Wight’s collections made in 1835 available in Wight’s and Hooker’s herbaria. The collection locality was cited as “Indiae Or. Provincia Carnatic, prope Courtallum” and Wight’s specimens as “Wight” without any collection number. No additional details were provided in the protologue. In the absence of a designated type, all of Wight’s specimens from Courtallum are to be treated as syntypes (Art. 40. Note 1 of ICN, McNeill et al. 2012; McNeill 2014).

This species could be considered to already have been lectotypified by Hay (1992: 195), by the application of Art. 9.9 of ICN ( McNeill et al. 2012). He specified the type as “Type: India. Karnataka: Courtallum, Wight 2776 (holotype, K)”. Because there are two sheets at K that potentially trace to this gathering, one from Bentham’s and one from Hooker’s herbaria, this might be taken as a first-step lectotypification under Art. 9.17 ( McNeill et al. 2012). The specimen from Hooker’s herbarium ( K 000499254) has a different locality and date (“Bolimsuetty, November 1852 ”) on one label, but “ Wight 2776 ” on another. If the first label is correct this cannot be part of the same gathering as that cited by Schott. The “Bolimsuetty, November 1852 ” label could have been an erroneous entry during remounting, but the herbarium stamp from 1867, being partially on top of it, suggests it has been on the sheet at least that long. There is no basis for it being considered original material and hence it cannot be treated as a syntype. It can be established that the other specimen ( K 000499255), from Bentham’s herbarium, was seen by Schott and would be original material, but it does not contain the locality or collector information cited by Schott in the protologue.

Hay’s apparent designation of a type is faulty for the following reasons: 1) a single specimen was not designated as the type, since K has more than one of Wight 2776 specimen, so a more precise indication of a particular specimen as type was required (Art. 9.17 of ICN, McNeill et al. 2012), 2) none of the specimens at K match the collection details Hay provided, 3) all the specimens cited, seen, or studied by the author of the species would be syntypes, so one among them should have been designated as lectotype and not as holotype, 4) “Courtallum” in the present state of Tamil Nadu, India is the type locality of the species, but Hay cited “ Karnataka ” as the probable state of the type locality, perhaps by mistaking the name for “Carnatic” specified by Schott (1857: 127). Carnatic refers to a geographical region in South India lying between the Eastern Ghats and the Coromandel Coast; and now it covers most parts of the modern state of Tamil Nadu. Given these discrepancies, we therefore reject Hay’s designation.

The ideal lectotype of the species would be one of the specimens seen and studied by Schott at the herbarium of the Natural History Museum, Vienna ( W) where he worked on aroids and prepared pencil drawings apart from getting watercolor drawings by eminent plant painters of that time under his direct supervision. Riedl (1965) and Mayo et al. (1997) reported that Schott’s aroid specimens and about 80 plates including those of the subfamily Lasioideae Engler (1876: 144) which includes Anaphyllum were destroyed towards the end of World War II in 1945. The first author studied illustrations of several aroids, including that of Anaphyllum beddomei (No. 238) and A. wightii (Nos. 236, 237), at W. The images of Schott’s entire available aroid drawings have been microfilmed and published by IDC (1984) with an alphabetic index provided by Nicolson (1984). Wight’s specimens in Hooker’s herbarium have been distributed to various herbaria and the first author has examined the specimens available at CAL, herbaria of the Harvard University, Massachusetts ( GH), K and herbarium of the Botanische Staatssammlung München, Munich ( M). A recent search on JSTOR (2015) revealed availability of specimens of the species also at the herbarium of the Botanical Garden, University of Copenhagen, Denmark ( C), herbarium of the National Museum of Natural History, Paris ( P) and S, and high resolution images of the specimens were obtained from there. Detailed examination and close scrutiny of the specimens and images showed that a specimen (S-G-8276) at S presumably examined by Schott, matched well with the description provided in the protologue, and hence is designated here as the lectotype of the species.

Figures

FIGURE 2. Lectotype of Anaphyllum wightii (S-G-8276). (Image reproduced with permission from Swedish Museum of Natural History, Stockholm).