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This genus is accepted, and its native range is Tropical Africa to Sri Lanka.

[FTEA]

Acanthaceae (part 1), Kaj Vollesen, Flora of Tropical East Africa, 2008

Habit
Perennial (rarely annual) herbs, subshrubs or shrubs.
Leaves
Leaves opposite or in whorls of 4, from below middle usually gradually narrowed into a long-decurrent base.
Flowers
Flowers single, in dense sessile or pedunculate, terminal or axillary spikes; bracts imbricate, in 4 rows, persistent, papery to coriaceous, with straight or recurved often pungent tip or 3-lobed at apex, margin entire, toothed, spinulose or setose; lower sterile and smaller; bracteoles 2, usually linear to lanceolate and acuminate to cuspidate, usually herbaceous.
Calyx
Calyx glumaceous, divided to base in 5 unequal sepals which are thickened and horny at base; dorsal sepal 2-veined and 2-toothed (in C. cephalostachya and leucodonta 1-veined and 1-toothed), broader than and often enveloping the rest, ventral and lateral 1-veined and 1-toothed, lateral smaller than ventral.
Corolla
Corolla puberulous outside; tube linear, usually widened above stamens, with a band of hairs at insertion of stamens; limb and top of tube split posteriorly to give a single 5-lobed lower lip, lobes oblong, obtuse, middle broadest and often emarginate.
Stamens
Stamens 4, included, usually inserted ± 1/3 down the tube, subsessile; anthers 1-thecous, oblong, usually rounded to finely apiculate, finely bearded.
Ovary
Ovary 2-locular with 2 ovules per locule, glabrous or minutely hairy near top; style usually glabrous, gibbous or not below the obliquely trumpet-shaped or obscurely 2-lobed stigma which is at the same height as anthers.
Fruits
Capsule 4-seeded, ellipsoid, sessile, glumaceous, glabrous and shiny.
Seeds
Seed discoid, obliquely ovoid, covered by large appressed laciniate scales.
Distribution
Range: 52 species in tropical Africa and Madagascar with 1 species extending to India and 1 species endemic in Arabia.

[FSOM]

M. Thulin et al. Flora of Somalia, Vol. 1-4 [updated 2008] https://plants.jstor.org/collection/FLOS

Corolla
Corolla white, yellow, orange or red, limb and top of tube split on the back and forming a single 5-lobed lower lip
Stamens
Stamens 4, included; anthers 1-celled, finely bearded
Ovary
Ovary 2-celled with 2 ovules per cell; style with obliquely trumpet-shaped stigma
Fruits
Capsule ellipsoid, 4-seeded
Seeds
Seeds flattened, covered by fringed scales and sticky when wet.
Distribution
Some 50 species in tropical Africa, Madagascar, south-western part of the Arabian Peninsula, and in southern Asia.
Habit
Herbs, subshrubs or shrubs
Leaves
Leaves opposite or seemingly in whorls of 4, usually narrowed from below middle into a long attenuate base
Inflorescences
Flowers in dense terminal or axillary spikes; bracts in 4 rows, persistent, often with pungent tip, the margin entire, toothed, spinulose or setose, the lower bracts sterile, smaller than the fertile ones; bracteoles 2, narrow
Calyx
Calyx deeply 5-lobed; lobes unequal, the upper 2-toothed, broader than the others and often enveloping them

Native to:

Angola, Bangladesh, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Repu, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Ghana, India, Ivory Coast, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Northern Provinces, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Yemen, Zambia, Zaïre, Zimbabwe

Introduced into:

Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, Leeward Is., Myanmar, Nicaragua, Puerto Rico, Trinidad-Tobago, Venezuelan Antilles, Vietnam, Windward Is.

Crossandra Salisb. appears in other Kew resources:

First published in Parad. Lond. 1: t. 12 (1805)

Accepted by

  • Govaerts, R. (1999). World Checklist of Seed Plants 3(1, 2a & 2b): 1-1532. MIM, Deurne.

Literature

Flora of West Tropical Africa

  • —F.T.A. 5: 112.

Flora of Somalia

  • Flora Somalia, (2000) Author: by M. Thulin [updated by M. Thulin 2008]
  • Vollesen in Kew Bull. 45: 503–534 (1990).

Flora of Tropical East Africa

  • K.B. 45: 504 (1990)
  • K.B. 24: 334 (1970)
  • F.T.A. 5: 112 (1899)
  • G.P. 2: 1094 (1876)
  • DC., Prodr. 11: 280 (1847)
  • Parad. Lond.: t. 12 (1805)

Art and Illustrations in Digifolia
Digital Image © Board of Trustees, RBG Kew

Flora of Somalia
Flora of Somalia
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

Flora of Tropical East Africa
Flora of Tropical East Africa
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

Kew Backbone Distributions
The International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families 2021. Published on the Internet at http://www.ipni.org and http://apps.kew.org/wcsp/
© Copyright 2017 World Checklist of Selected Plant Families. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0

Kew Names and Taxonomic Backbone
The International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families 2021. Published on the Internet at http://www.ipni.org and http://apps.kew.org/wcsp/
© Copyright 2017 International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0