Elleanthus Presl, Rel. Haenk. 1: 97, 1827. 
Sepals free, rarely spreading; dorsal sepal concave; lateral 
sepals basally connivent, gibbose. Petals free, usually thinner 
in texture. Lip longer than sepals, concave with a flared apex, 
basally cymbiform, excavate or gibbous with one or two dis- 
tinct corpuscles or calli. Column erect, footless but with ob- 
lique base, winged above. Stigmata confluent into one, promi- 
nent under the triangular rostellum. Anther incumbent. Pol- 
linia 8, in unequal massulae. Erect or branching shrublike 
plants with fibrous roots. Stem erect, ascending or decumbent, 
cane-like, leafy. Leaves distichous, rigid, plicate, sessile on 
arpophyllaceous, adpressed leaf-sheath. Inflorescence termi- 
nal, racemose or subcapitate, commonly rather dense and 
many-flowered, rarely lax and few-flowered. Bracts conspicu- 
ous, but not foliaceous. Flowers rather small, but attractively 
colored. 
Lectotype: Elleanthus lancifolius Pres| [Britton & Wilson 
in Sci. Surv. Porto Rico 5, pt. 2: 203, 1924]. 
Approximately 70 species in tropical America and West 
Indies. 
KEY TO SECTIONS 
1. Rachis shortened into a tightly packed, subglobose head; column witha 
prominent, infrastigmatic protuberance forming a distinct men- 
FORE ne ces area aoa oe Hew eee eae eee OSEAN Sect. Cephalelyna 
la. Rachis elongate, densely or loosely spicate; column without an infras- 
tigmatic mentum, at most angular-protuberant .................- 2 
2.  Intlorescence AtCral 665445262440s seen ndsoes ce es Sect. Laterales 
Das. WMOTeSCenCe TETTINA :ecncscnectio das age sth Vea eee ee ees 3 
3 Flowers and bracts in an all-sided spike or secund .............. 4 
3a. Flowers and bracts in a distichous to bifarious spike, either approxi- 
mate, imbricate or remote ona flexuous to strongly fractiflex raceme . 7 
4. Calli of lip freely exposed in basal cavity ............. 00. e eee 5 
4a. Calliof lip partially hidden behind a transverse membrane covering the 
entrance to basal cavity in part ............... Sect. Hymenophora 
5. Calliof lip tightly approximate or confluent in fresh condition, variously 
sulcate in middle, especially when dried, centrally affixed to didymous 
CAV a inen anew eas os eaten oop b Ge tL oeee CEST OeR Sect. Calelyna 
Sa. Calli of lip free from one another and distinctly separated, each located 
either at the center or at the base of their respective cavities ..... 6 
6. Column with a biauriculate clinandrium; lateral sepals more or less 
CONMMEMNG cosas ces coe eer lade cee Raa gees Sect. Otiophora 
6 
