Ocotea pithyusa (Kolakovsky & Schakryl) Doweld, 2018

Doweld, Alexander B., 2018, Palaeoflora Europaea: Notulae Systematicae ad Palaeofloram Europaeam spectantes I. New names of fossil magnoliophytes of the European Tertiary. I. Miscellaneous families, Phytotaxa 379 (1), pp. 78-94 : 84

Ocotea pithyusa (Kolakovsky & Schakryl) Doweld , comb. nov.

≡ Laurophyllum pithyusum Kolakovsky & Schakryl (1962: 45, pl. 8, figs. 11–14).

= Laurophyllum nobile Kolakovsky & Schakryl (in Takhtajan 1975: 47, text-fig. 20: 1–4), nom. illeg. & superfl.—“ Laurophyllum nobile ” Kolakovsky & Schakryl (in Kolakovsky1959: 348), nom. inval. (Art. 40.1).

Type:—[fossil leaves] Pitsunda, Abkhazia (holotype, П-115, Sukhum Botanical Garden, Sukhum, Abkhazia, n.v.).

Occurrence:—Pliocene (Upper Pontian); Caucasus.

IFPNI: 68E99B4E-40D9-B57E-89A0-01B49653B71D.

Note:—The fossil-species “ Laurophyllum nobile” Kolakovsky & Schakryl (in Kolakovsky 1959: 348) was not validly published, since the authors did not designate the type (ICN, Art. 40.1), based the description on several leaf imprints (Coll. II-202, 445, 457, 543, 558, 614, 625). The fossil-species was validated later by Kolakovsky & Schakryl (in Takhtajan 1975: 47), but the action was nomenclaturally superfluous since the authors included in synonymy previously validly published fossil-species Laurophyllum pithyusum Kolakovsky & Schakryl (1962) , therefore, Laurophyllum nobile Kolakovsky & Schakryl (in Takhtajan 1975: 47) is illegitimate and nomenclaturally superfluous. The structure of the leaf epidermis of the fossil-species is similar to several extant species of Ocotea ( Schakryl 1965) , viz. О. glaucina Mez and О. floribunda Benth. et Hook. , as well as О. argentea Меz and О. glaucina Mez.