670 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



autumn or winter. Leaves (Plate 206, Fig. 19), about 6 inches long and 8 inches 

 wide, cordate at the base, deeply five-lobed ; lobes, oblong or ovate, acuminate at 

 the apex, each with three or four small teeth on the margin, which is neither serrate 

 nor ciliate ; sinuses, reaching two-thirds the length of the leaf, acute at the base ; 

 upper surface dark green, shining, glabrous ; lower surface light green, glabrous, 

 except for conspicuous tufts of reddish-brown pubescence in the axils of the primary 

 and secondary nerves ; petioles without milky sap. 



Flowers, appearing with the leaves, in erect, long-stalked corymbs ; bracts and 

 bracteoles conspicuous, J inch long ; filaments glabrous, ovary pubescent. Fruit, 

 ripening in autumn ; keys if inch long, narrowly divergent ; carpels scurfy 

 pubescent when young, glabrous when mature ; wings broad. 



The leaves are variable as regards the depth of the sinuses, being described by 

 Medwedjeff as either five-lobed or five-partite ; and the description above applies 

 to the deeply-cut form, which is in cultivation. 



The foliage resembles in size and shape some forms of the sycamore, but can be 

 readily distinguished by the margin being simply dentate and not serrate. The 

 buds are also different. In winter the terminal buds are ovoid, obtuse, with six outer 

 scales, the lower pair of which are shining, dark red and glabrous, with the middle 

 and upper parts ciliate ; lateral buds distinctly stalked, arising at an acute angle ; 

 twigs polished, dark red, glabrous. 



This species was discovered by Radde ' in 1864 in the Caucasus at an elevation 

 of 6000 feet, and was at first identified by Trautvetter with A. platanoides, which it 

 resembles in no respect. It is allied to A. insigne, and has a more westerly dis- 

 tribution than that species, growing on both sides of the main chain of the Caucasus, 

 but not extending into Talysch or Persia. It is a tree of high elevations, growing 

 at 6000 to 8000 feet altitude in company with birch and subalpine shrubs, or mixed 

 with Abies Nordmanniana on the edges of alpine meadows, and flowers in May. It 

 ascends in many places to the timber line, and at lower levels is replaced in the 

 forests by the Norway maple.^ According to Wolf the tree attains 50 feet in 

 height and 6 feet in girth ; but Radde ^ gives the measurement of a tree, probably 

 of this species, which was 1 20 years old and 62 cubic feet in volume. 



This species was raised in van Volxem's nursery from seeds collected in 1866 

 by Balansa in Lazistan, and for a long time was confused with A. insigne^ being 

 described and figured under that name in the Botanical Magazine. Van Volxem 

 informed Sir J. Hooker that it was the hardiest of the eighty species and varieties 

 of maple cultivated by him, having withstood without injury the disastrous winters 

 of 1879-80 and 1880-81 ; and being a late grower, it had never even been nipped 

 by spring frosts. At Kew, where there are two healthy trees, it is one of the latest 

 maples to come into leaf The tree sent by van Volxem to Dr. Masters flowered 



Pflanzenverb. Kaukasusland, io8, 175, 225, 310(1899). 



' Hid. 245. Radde speaks of A. platanoides and A. Trautvetten growing together in impassable thickets, which are 

 beaten down by the heavy snow. 



' A. Trautvetteri has also been confused with A. Volxemi, as in Card. Chron. x. 188, note, and 189 (1891). Rehder, 

 in Cycl. Am. Hurt. 15 (1890), agrees with me that the tree, figured in Bot. Mag. 6697, is the true A. Trautvttteri, though 

 it differs from wild specimens preserved in the Kew herbarium, in ha\'ing the leaves more deeply cut. 



