﻿AGAVE MACROACANTHA AND ALLIED EUAGAVES. 



By William Trelease. 



In 1833, Zuccarini* characterized, with unusual accuracy 

 for the time, several Mexican species of Agave which had been 

 sent to the Munich Garden in small specimens by Karwinski, 

 who is known to have spent four years in Oaxaca. 



Three of these, evidently closely related, were named A. 

 macroacantha, A. pugioniformis, and A. Karwinskii. All 

 had erecto-patent rigid leaves with strong blackish end- 

 spine and marginal prickles, the latter noted as sometimes 

 fieshy-based in the second species. The intervening margin 

 in all is described as herbaceous (in contrast with the horny 

 margin of A. heteracantha) and glabrous (apparently in con- 

 trast with A. striata, where it is very scabrid). The first two, 

 when described, were acaulescent and with glaucous or glauces- 

 cent foUage: the third had a short trunk and green leaves. 

 Though their names still appear in various connections, the 

 second and third have been practically lost to botanical 

 knowledge for nearly half a century, and the other is usually 

 credited to a wrong primary division of the genus. 



The year following their description, Salm Dyck,t who 

 possessed the most noted succulent collection of his day, 

 in a list of the Agaves known to him recognized the first two 

 of these species, but made no mention of the third. Under 

 A. macroacantha he adds a remark that A, flavescens (a name 

 not earlier published, but said to be of Munich origin and 

 presumably applied to a plant likewise collected by Karwinski) 

 closely approaches and may be a seminal variation of this 

 species, differing in its subrecurving leaves and less colored 



^ In his classical treatise on the Amaryllidaceae, Herbert^ 

 lists the three species of Zuccarini, but writes macracaniha 



* Zuccarini, Act. Acad. Caes. Leop. Carol. Nat. Cur. 16^ : 676^7. (1833). 

 t Salm Dyck, Hortus Dyckensis. 8, 305-6. (1834). 

 1 Herbert, AmaryUidaceae. 127-8. (1837). 



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