| # The Families of Angiosperms |

L. Watson and M.J. Dallwitz

### Ellisiophyllaceae Honda

~ Scrophulariaceae.

Habit and leaf form. Prostrate herbs. Leaves alternate; long petiolate; simple. Lamina dissected; pinnatifid.

Leaf anatomy. Stomata present; anomocytic.

Reproductive type, pollination. Unisexual flowers absent. Plants hermaphrodite.

Inflorescence, floral, fruit and seed morphology. Flowers solitary (long pedicellate); axillary; very irregular; zygomorphic. The floral irregularity involving the perianth and involving the androecium. Flowers cyclic; tetracyclic. Free hypanthium absent. Hypogynous disk present; annular (large, cupular).

Perianth with distinct calyx and corolla; 10; 2 whorled; isomerous. Calyx 5; 1 whorled; gamosepalous; imbricate. Corolla 5; 1 whorled; gamopetalous; imbricate; obscurely unequal but not bilabiate.

Androecium 4. Androecial members adnate (to the corolla); free of one another; 1 whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens (?). Stamens 4; reduced in number relative to the adjacent perianth; oppositisepalous; alternating with the corolla members; filantherous (exserted). Anthers dehiscing via longitudinal slits; introrse.

Gynoecium 2 carpelled. Carpels reduced in number relative to the perianth. The pistil 2 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; synovarious to synstylovarious; superior. Ovary 2 locular. Gynoecium stylate. Styles 1 (shortly bifid); apical. Placentation axile. Ovules 3–4 per locule; non-arillate; anatropous; unitegmic; tenuinucellate. Endothelium differentiated. Endosperm formation cellular.

Fruit non-fleshy; dehiscent, or indehiscent (?); a capsule, or capsular-indehiscent (globular, more or less membranous, on a spirally retracting peduncle). Seeds copiously endospermic; large (large, peltate, pelviform); minutely conspicuously hairy (mucilaginous when wetted). Embryo well differentiated (small, very excentric). Cotyledons 2. Embryo straight.

Physiology, phytochemistry. Inulin not found.

Geography, cytology. Paleotropical. Sub-tropical, tropical. India to Formosa, Philippines, New Guinea.

Taxonomy. Subclass Dicotyledonae; Tenuinucelli (?). Dahlgren’s Superorder Lamiiflorae (?); Lamiales. Cronquist’s Subclass Asteridae; Scrophulariales. APG III core angiosperms; core eudicot; Superorder Asteranae; lamiid. APG IV Order Lamiales (as a synonym of Scrophulariaceae).

Species 1 (Ellisiophyllim pinnatum). Genera 1; only genus, Ellisiophyllum.

General remarks. See Yamazaki 1957. Seemingly distinguishable from Scrophulariaceae only by the spectacularly hairy seeds.

Illustrations. • Ellisiophyllum pinnatum, as Moseleya: Hook. Ic. Pl. 26 (1899). • Ellisiophyllum pinnatum (Flora of China).

We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, distributions of character states within any set of taxa, geographical distribution, genera included in each family, and classifications (Dahlgren; Dahlgren, Clifford, and Yeo; Cronquist; APG). See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.

Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 1992 onwards. The families of flowering plants: descriptions, illustrations, identification, and information retrieval. Version: 8th June 2026. delta-intkey.com’.

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