560 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. vol. 59. 



Phylum ANGIOSPERMOPHYTA. 



Class M0N0C0TYLED0NAE. 



Order SCITAMINALES. 

 Family MUSACEAE. 



Genus HELICONIA Linnaeus. 



HELICONIA ELEGANS (Engelhardt.) 



Musophyllum elegans Engelhardt, Abh. Senck. Naturf. Gesell., vol. 19, p. 25, pi. 2, 

 figs. 1-3; pi. 5, fig. 1, 1895. 



Oblong leaves, evidently of large size, but only preserved as frag- 

 ments. These indicate a leaf up to 20 cm. in maximum width and 

 with an estimated length of at least 70 cm. Margins entire except 

 where the lamina was mechanically split. Midrib stout, prominent, 

 and cylindrical, about .5 cm. in diameter in the preserved material. 

 Leaf substance of considerable consistency. Lateral veins closely 

 spaced, parallel, diverging from the midrib at wide angles that vary 

 from 70 to 90 degrees in different specimens. The laterals are rela- 

 tively straight but curve slightly upward, particularly in the marginal 

 region. At regular intervals of about one centimeter there is a 

 slightly stouter lateral. All terminate in the margins. 



This species was described by Engelhardt from a tuff near Santa 

 Ana in the valley of the Rio Magdalena in Colombia. The single 

 fragment, shown in the accompanying figure, and 10.5 cm. in length 

 by 12 cm. in width, was collected in Venezuela. It is obviously 

 identical with the Colombian material. Both are here transferred to 

 the genus Heliconia. Two additional fossil species are known from 

 tropical America, namely, a fragment from the Tertiary of Costa 

 Rica and a well marked species from the Pliocene of the montafia 

 country of eastern Bolivia. The latter was a much smaller form than 

 the present species and lacked any differential development of the 

 lateral veins. 



The genus Heliconia has between 30 and 40 existing species. These 

 are confined to the American tropics, where they range from the 

 Antilles to Brazil and Bolivia. They are exceedingly common in 

 Central America and the lower montana region of Peru and Bolivia, 

 where I have observed species at elevations up to around 6,000 feet, 

 associated with many representatives of the tropical lowland flora. 



The genus Musophyllum was established by Goeppert 12 in 1854 for 

 fossil banana leaves from the island of Java. Subsequently about a 

 dozen different species have been referred to this genus. The bulk 



« Goeppert, H. R., Tertiarllora InselJava, p. 39, 1854. 



