(Meissner, 1864) that are not present in the American species. Therefore, based solely on the 
character of venation pattern, it is not clear whether the American species with pinninerved 
leaves and those with triplinerved leaves are related correspondingly to the sections of 
Cinnamomum in the Old World. In other words, are the American species of Cinnamomum with 
pinninerved leaves closer to section Camphora?, and do the species with triplinerved leaves 
belong to the same evolutionary line that represents section Cinnamomum? 
To date, placing of the studied species in Phoebe or Cinnamomum has generally been 
derived from the survey of regional floras, but no attempt has been advanced to study the whole 
group of taxa at once. This is my purpose here, since this is the best way to solve general 
problems in systematics. Thus, the main questions addressed here are: 1) do the American 
species formerly included in Phoebe belong in Cinnamomum?, 2) are the triplinerved and 
pinninerved species of the group to be studied congeneric?, and 3) what are the phylogenetic 
relationships among these species? 
Procedures 
I. Taxonomic revision. Loans of Phoebe and Cinnamomum specimens from the 
Neotropics, including the nomenclatural types for the species currently or formerly included in 
these genera, were requested from the principal herbaria in the United States (A, F, GH, LL, 
MICH, NY, US), Europe (B, BM, BR, C, G, K, P, S, U, W) and Latin America (ENCB, MEXU, 
R, RB, SP, VEN). Several herbaria (BHCB, ENCB, F, HB, HXBH, IAN, IBGE, IEB, MBM, 
MEXU, MG, MY, NY, R, RB, SP, SPF, SPSF, UB, UEC, VEN) were visited to find additional 
specimens of the subject species by looking at holdings of related genera and unidentified 
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