Verbascum longifolium, Ten.

Tutin, T. G., Heywood, V. H., Burges, N. A., Moore, D. M., Valentine, D. H., Walters, S. M. & Webb, D. A., 1972, Flora Europaea. Volume 3. Diapensiacea to Myoporaceae, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press : 211

36. V. longifolium Ten. , FI. Nap. 1, Prodr.-. 16 (1811)

(inch V. pachyurum Bornm. , V. samaritana Heldr. ex Boiss. , V. epirotum Halâcsy ).

Biennial or perennial, more or less densely whitish- or yellowish-tomentose, fioccose above; stem 50-150 cm. Basal leaves 20-50 x 5-15 cm, elliptic-oblong to ovate-lanceolate, acute to acuminate, entire or slightly crenate; petiole 2-7 cm. Inflorescence usually simple. Bracts 12-20(-40) mm, linear; longer pedicels 10-16 mm. Calyx 5-8 mm; lobes linearlanceolate or lanceolate. Corolla 25-35 mm in diameter. Stamens 5, the upper with densely villous filaments, the lower with glabrous to villous filaments and obliquely inserted or shortly decurrent anthers; filament-hairs white, yellow or pale violet. Stigma davate to subspathulate, shortly decurrent. Capsule 5-8 mm,

ellipsoid. • Balkan peninsula, C. & S. Italy. Al Bu Gr It Ju.

Plants from Italy usually have a relatively lax, slender inflorescence and at least some of the filament-hairs violet; most, but not all plants from the Balkan peninsula have a stouter and denser inflorescence and white or yellow filament-hairs. There are, however, too many exceptions to allow subspecies to be effectively delimited.

A single plant from S.E. Jugoslavia (near the Bulgarian border, S.E. of Nis), with leaves green, not tomentose, pedicels c. 5 mm, filament-hairs violet, anthers of lower stamens long-decurrent and stigma long-decurrent, has been named V. viridissimum Stoj. & Stefanov , Österr. Bot. Zeitschr. 73: 281 (1924). Its status is obscure, but it seems to be most closely related to 36.