^■^'^ VALERiANACE^. [Cf iitranthus. 



Order XLI. VALEEIANACEiE, Juss. 



" Calyx - tube adnate with the ovary, the limb toothed, or a 

 thickened margin at the top of the ovary, at length unfolding 

 into a feathery pappus. Corolla with 3 — 6 lobes. Ovary with 1 

 perfect cell and often 2 or 3 abortive ones. Fruit dry, indehis- 

 cent, 1-seeded. iSeecZ pendulous. — liea.ves opposite, without sti- 

 pules."— Br. Fl. 



I. Centeanthus,* DeCand. Spur Valerian. 



"Corolla 5- cleft, spurred at the base. Stamen 1. Fruit 

 crowned with a feathery pappus." — Br. Fl. 



A genus instituted by DeCandolIe, for the reception of such of the Valerians as 

 are monandrous and have the perianth distinctly spurred, — characters somewhat 

 artificial, but authorized by the expediency of dividing <;o large a genus as Vale- 

 riana was left by Linnaeus, and from which the present recedes considerably in 

 habit. The few species composing it are natives of the S. of Europe, and are 

 merely naturalized with us. They affect very dry warm situations, on old walls, 

 rocks, &c., not moist, cool or alpine ones, like the true Valerians. 



*1. C. ruber, DC. Red Spur-jlower. Red Valerian. " Leaves 

 ovate-lanceolate, spur much shorter than the ovary." — Br. Fl. p. 

 192. Valeriana, L.: E. B.t. 1531. 



On old walls and rocks, sometimes also (but not in this island) in chalk-pits ; 

 rare, and not indigenous. Fl. June — September. If.. 



E. Med. — On the garden wall of Morton house. Old walls at Brading. 



W. Med. — On Yarmouth castle, abundantly, with the blossoms of every shade 

 between white and deep red. Carisbrooke castle, W. Wilson Saunders, Esq. 



A general favourite in gardens, from whence it easily disseminates itselt by its 

 volatile seeds on walls, rocks, ruins and chalky cliffs. Sir James Smith says it is 

 certainly wild iu the chalk-pits of Kent, and I have seen it growing abundantly 

 on rocks at Plymouth, Dawlish, and other places iu the W. of England, where, 

 though perfectly naturalized, there are no grounds for pronouncing it indigenous. 



II. Valeriana, Linn. Valerian. 



" Corolla 5-cleft, gibbous at the base. Stamiens 3. Fruit 

 crowned with a feathery pappus." — Br. Fl. 



1. V. officinalis, L. Common or Great Wild Valerian. " Stem 

 sulcate stoloniferous, leaves all jpinnatifid, leaflets lanceolate nearly 

 uniform."— i?r. Fl. p. 192. E. B. t. 698. 



In wet woods and thickets, by river- and ditch-banks, and in other marshy 

 situations, in various places abundantly. Fl. May — August, l^. 



By Yarbridge, and in various parts of Sandown level. Abundant about Alver- 

 ston, near the mill, &c. Great Birchraore farm. Common in swampy thickets 

 along the course of the Medina above Newport, as at Blackwater. Plentiful in 

 Horringford withy-bed. Abundant in willow-beds and other moist places about 

 Budbridge. Moor-farm withy-bed. 



* Name from usvTpov, a spur, and av5o;, a Jlower, in reference to the spur or 

 gibbosity at the base of the corolla. 



