ORDER PRINCIPES
[FAMILY 18.] PALMAE
Stem woody, usually simple. Leaves pinnately or palmately split, at least 2-cleft, usually collected in a crown at the top of the stem. Flowers in simple or branched spadices enveloped by spathes, usually unisexual and provided with rudimentary stamens or carpels. Perianth-segments 6, similar in texture, but often unequal in size, leathery or parchment-like, green, white or yellow. Stamens 6 or more, rarely 3, united at the base or adnate below to the perianth. Carpels 3, superior, distinct or united and then forming a 1-3-celled ovary; sometimes 2 carpels empty or reduced to the style. Ovules solitary in each cell, filling the cell and sometimes adhering to its wall. Fruits berry-or drupe-like. Seeds with a small embryo and horny albumen.—Genera 36, species 100. (Plates 10 and 11.)
1. Carpels 3, distinct. Fruit consisting of 1-3 smooth berries. Leaf-segments induplicate in bud. [Subfamily CORYPHOIDEAE.] 2
Carpels 3, united and forming a 1-3-celled ovary, or carpel 1. 3
2. Leaves fan-shaped. Spadices with 2 or more incomplete spathes. Flowers polygamous or dioecious. Perianth of the female flowers as in the male.
Seed ovate, not deeply grooved; albumen ruminate. Stem short, usually branched.—Species 1 (Ch. humilis L.). North-West Africa.
Used as an ornamental plant; the leaf-buds are eaten and the fibres used for making ropes or paper or for stuffing cushions. “Dwarf-palm.”
[Tribe SABALEAE.] Chamaerops L.
Leaves pinnate. Spadices with one complete spathe. Flowers dioecious.
Perianth of the female flowers differing from the male. Seed oblong, with a deep longitudinal groove.—Species 5. Some (especially the date-palm, Ph. dactylifera L.) have edible fruits, also used for making brandy and sugar. They yield also palm-wine, wood, and fibres for plaiting and stuffing, and are used as ornamental plants. [Tribe PHOENICEAE.] Phoenix L.
3. Leaves fan-shaped. Spadices with many incomplete spathes. Fruit a drupe with 1-3 distinct stones; epicarp smooth or minutely dotted.
[Subfamily BORASSOIDEAE, tribe BORASSEAE.] 4
Leaves pinnately dissected or 2-cleft. Fruit berry-like or covered with imbricate scales or containing a single stone; if fruit drupe-like and one-seeded, then spadices with 1-4 complete spathes. 8
CYPERACEAE.
FLOW. PL. AFR.
Pl. 9.
J. Fleischmann del.
Kyllinga alba Nees