Solaneae, subtribe Lyciinae, along with Lycium and 
Atropa. Until more work is done on the phylogenetic 
relationships in this family, these considerations will re- 
main problematical. 
The generic epithet Latua was taken trom the native 
Mapuche name for the plant. ‘Two variants of the name 
have appeared in the literature: /atve (Philippi, 1858; 
Lenz, 1904; Reiche, 1910) and /atué (Murillo, 1889: 
Valenzuela, 1917; Guncekel, 1959). Plowman recorded 
a third variant /atuy, in use at Puerto Montt in the 
Province of Llanquihue. Most probably several varia- 
tions in pronunciation exist from one locality to another. 
Latue and the longer form datue-hue are translated : ‘that 
which causes (something) to die’*. hese forms are de- 
rived from the Mapuche words /an, ‘‘to die’: tu, a 
‘ausative particle: and Awe, ‘‘the instrument with which 
something is done” (Febrés, 1765; Lenz, 1904: Valen- 
zuela, 1917). This native name for the plant indicates 
an explicit recognition of its poisonous nature. 
The Spanish names of Latua also reveal a knowledge 
of its toxic properties: palo mato, literally ‘‘the tree that 
kills’, meaning the same as latte (Philippi, 1858): pado 
de los brujos (Philippi, 1858), arbol de los brujos (Lenz, 
1904) and palo de bruja (Philippi, 1869: Miranda, 1918), 
. 
all meaning ‘‘witches’ tree”. 
Latua should be regarded first as a poisonous plant. 
Its toxicity has been frequently mentioned in the litera- 
ture (Murillo, 1889; Dragendorff, 1898; Reiche, 1901: 
Lewin, 1929), although there are very few records of 
actual poisonings. Accidental poisonings are apparently 
frequent, due to the superficial resemblance of Latua 
to 2 commonly used medicinal plant of the same region, 
the tayu (Dasyphyllum diacanthoides (uess.) Cabr. = 
Flotowia diacanthoides Wess... Compositae). This con- 
fusion was first mentioned by Philippi (1861) in his 
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