Volume 1
Catalogue of the African plants collected by Dr. Friedrich Welwitsch in 1853-61.
- British Museum (Natural History) Department of Botany
- Date:
- 1896-1901
Licence: In copyright
Credit: Catalogue of the African plants collected by Dr. Friedrich Welwitsch in 1853-61. Source: Wellcome Collection.
91/392 page 59
![Symphonia] XXI. GUTTIFERiE. These are stately evergreen trees, although few species reach a o-reat height. Symphonia globulifera L. f. is one of the most beau- tiful trees of Upper Angola, on account of its deep-red flowers and shining leaves. The Guttiferse appear very seldom to bear fruit; the only species which Welwitsch found with fruit is Garcinia angolensis Vesque. They have firm fine-grained wood, white and sometimes of a rose-red hue, and very durable, especially that of the latter species. Welwitsch states that he saw a species of Calophyllvm culti- vated around Sierra Leone, at Freetown, but that it was not in flower, and the specimens of the leaves which he collected became rotten during his illness at sea. 1. SYMPHONIA L. f.; Benth. & Hook. f. Gen. PI. i. p. 173. 1. S. globulifera L. f. Suppl. Sp. PI. p. 302 (1781); Oliv. FI. Trop. Afr. i. p. 163 ; Vesque in DO. Mon. Phan. viii. p. 227 (1893); var. africana Yesque, lx., p. 230 (1893). Actinostigma speciosum Welw. Apont. p. 560, under n. 139. Actinostigma (sp.), Welw. Synopse p. 9, n. 12. A tree with the habit of a laurel, copiously flowering, 15 to 35 ft. high, with trunk 1 to If ft. diam. near the base, exuding a yellow sap like drops of gum, patently branched; leaves coriaceous in the dry state, penninerved, not punctate, of an opaque dark-green colour and moderately glossy above, pale-green beneath; calyx ebracteolate, persistent, comprising 5 very obtuse imbricate segments; petals 5, inserted at the external base of the hypogynous disk, alternating with the calyx-segments, sinistrorsely or dextrorsely convolute in a globose form, loosely cohering even at the time of flowering, scarlet; disk elevated, cyathiform, thick, yellow, undivided; stamens com- bined in a scarlet tube at first cylindrical and soon ventricose at the base, inserted at the internal base of the disk; tube 5-lobed; lobes broad-linear, flat at the base, triquetrous at the apex, inclined on the sinuses of the stigma, each outside below the apex bearing 3 anthers; anthers linear, parallel, adnate, extrorse, 2-celled, bi- arsitate at the apex, scarlet; ovary included in the staminal tube, free, 5-celled; cells pluri-ovulate; style very short, thick, topped by a 5-radiate stigma, rays yellow, after the time of flowering stellate, patent, their sinuses occupied by the triquetrous segments of the staminal tube which are bent inwards towards the centre of the stigma. Fruit not seen though subsequently looked for. Golungo Alto.—In warm spots of deep valleys in the primitive woods of Alta Queta, above N-delle (Undelle), fl. middle of April 1856. Native name “ Mungundo.” Sporadic. No. 1052. 2. PENTADESMA Sabine ; Benth. & Hook. f. Gen. PI. i. p. 174. 1. P. butyracea Sabine in Trans. Iiort. Soc. Lond. v. p. 457 (1824); Oliv., l.c., p. 164; Vesque, l.c., p. 247. St. Thomas’ Island.—Local name “ Pdo Ovd,” or “ Obd.” Probably collected m Dec. 1860. No. 6754. Determination doubtful.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28120486_0001_0093.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
