New World, it was necessary first to assess how distinct Cinnamomum is as an evolutionary line 
in the family. As it seemed to me that considering simple match of general morphology of the 
group of species studied here to the morphology of the group of paleotropical ones was in some 
way too simplistic to accept congeneric relationship, I surveyed how reliable the combinations of 
characters (in particular those distinguishing Cinnamomum) are in order to advance hypotheses 
of evolutionary relationship within the family, specifically between the group of species studied 
here and other taxa. This survey analyzed not only character distribution among genera placed 
near Cinnamomum but throughout the family, since several characters that are found in this 
genus are shared with genera in other groups. Moreover, no cladistic analysis of the Lauraceae 
has been published, and it was considered a good idea to start this kind of study in the family. 
For this purpose I took as a baseline the latest taxonomic account (Rohwer, 1993a) for the 
recognition of genera (number and characters), complementing the descriptive information with 
other original works on anatomical (Richter, 1981) and phytochemical surveys across the family 
(Gottlieb, 1972), as well as personal observations. 
Cladistics is chosen as the theoretical basis of the phylogenetic analysis because it 
enables us to infer evolutionary histories with a minimum of ambiguity. The methods and 
concepts developed in this philosophical approach of systematics have given to this branch of 
Biology its recognition as a true scientific field (Wiley, 1975, 1981). Among the major 
contributions of cladistics are: 1) the use of a method that allows reproducible results that can be 
reanalyzed by other authors, and 2) the possibility of elaborating classifications based on the 
recognition of monophyletic groups (Wiley et al., 1991). Central to cladistic methodology is 
parsimony; the principle that guides the process of analysis in order to minimize the 
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