Page 1 - TROIAetal2012

Phy tota.w1 71 : 48- 51 (20 12) Correspondence
www.mapress.com/phytotaxa/
Copyright r.fl 2012 Magnolia Press

Revised lectotypification of the name Calendula maritima (Asteraceae)

ANGELO TROIA*, WERNER GREUTER & FRANCESCO MARTA RAIMONDO

Dipartimento di Biologia ambientale e Biodiversità, Università degli Studi, via Archirajì 38, 1- 90123 Palermo, ltaly
*Authorfor correspondence. E- mail: angelo.troia@libero.it

Calendula marilima Gussone ( 1825: 3) is endemie to a few coastal areas near Trapani , western Sicily, Jtaly. Its
taxonomic distinctness is generally recognised, even though some authors have treated it as a subspecies
rather than species, either as C. incana subsp. maritima (Guss.) Ohle (1974: 279) or as C. suffruticosa subsp.
maritima (Guss.) Meikle (1976: 274), its uncertain position reflecting the difficulty in establishing a
satisfactory taxonomic classification within the highly diverse genus Calendula Linnaeus (1753: 921 ).
Calendula maritima has recently been included in an TUCN pilot project devoted to the study ofthe fifty most
threatened Mediterranean island plants (Montmollin & Strahm 2005) and, in that context, it has been made the
centra! subject of a special intemational meeting (Troia & Raimondo 2011 ).

Calendula maritima was one of tbe early species described by Giovanni Gussone (1787- 1866), whose
main works regarding Sicily and its surrounding islets were 'Florae Siculae Prodromus' (1827- 28) and
'Fiorae Siculae Synopsis' (1842-44) (Statleu & Cowan 1976). The protologue of C. maritima (Gussone 1825)
consists of a brief diagnostic description but lacks any indication of the type locality: 'C. incanae, pro qua
babui, et C. marginatae Willd. en. proxima; sed foliis integerrimis et viscositate omnium partium, guae
cultura perstat, ab utraque distincta'. In the following years, Gussone sent specimens of the new species to
severa! colleagues and friends all over Europe. Candolle (1838) accepted C. maritima Guss. and mentioned
the locality where it occuTs: 'in Sicilia circa Trapaniam'. Gussone (1844) eventually listed the places in which
he had found C. maritima: Trapani , the nearby islands ofRonciglio and Formiche, Mt. Cofano, and S. Vito.

In bis seminai revision of the perennial Calendula species of soutbern Europe, Ohle (1974) stated the type
('Typus') of C. maritima in the following terms: ' Sizilien , Ronciglio bei Trapani, leg. Gussone 1824 (FI)'.
Under the ' Code' (McNeill et al. 2012: Art. 9.8) that statement is equivalent to a lectotype designation.

Unfortunately, a search of the FI berbarium- with the kind and expert help of the curator, Chiara
Nepi- fai led to locate any such specimen (or indeed any specimen of C. maritima collected by Gussone). It is
not certain that Ohle had actually seen the FI specimen he cited; he might only have inferred that the type was
kept at FI, a hypothesis supported by the fact that he did not again include tbat specimen among the
'specimina visa' (= specimens seen), as he used to do for other type specimens be mentioned in tbe same
paper.

According to the 'Code' (McNeill et al. 2012: Art. 9.11), if "the previously designated lectotype has been
lost or destroyed [supposing it ever existed), a new lectotype may be designated" . Doing so is the purpose of
the present note.

Relevant berbarium materia! kept in BOLO, FI, NAP, PAL bas been studied. In addition, we also checked
some herbarium holdings available via the internet: B, BM, G, P, Z or on microfiche (G- DC) (acronyms
according to Thiers 20 12). Gussone's handwriting was identified by comparison with published samples
(Burdet 1975).

48 Accepted by Rafael Govaerts: 8 Nov. 2012; published online in PDF: 13 Nov. 2012