Source:
SSA
Description:
Perennial herbs. Leaves opposite or ternate, serrate. Inflorescences terminal, spike-like; flowers in dense, opposite, many-flowered, cymose clusters subtended by relatively large bracts, lower bracts leaf-like, often blotched with white or mauve. Calyx sub-bilabiate; tube at first campanulate, elongating and becoming tubular; upper lip of 3 subequal teeth; lower lip smaller, emarginate. Corolla small, bilabiate; tube campanulate; upper lip short, broad, subequally 4-lobed; lower lip narrow, oblong, concave. Stamens 4, didynamous, declinate, exserted; filaments pubescent in lower half, upper pair arising below middle of tube, lower pair arising near throat; anthers 1-thecous. Disc saucer-shaped, slightly produced in front. Style filiform, exserted, 2-lobed. Nutlets ellipsoid, compressed, brown. x = 9 (7-1 report) (polyploidy-1 report).
Distribution:
Species +/- 25, in tropical Africa, Madagascar and southeast Asia; 1 species is found from Magoebaskloof (Northern Province) along the eastern escarpment to Barberton and westward to Witbank (Mpumalanga) and Pretoria Districts (Gauteng), extending into Swaziland.
Classification:
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