Amaranthus graecizans

Raus, Thomas, 2022, Taxonomic, nomenclatural and floristic review of Amaranthaceae of Greece and neighbouring countries, Willdenowia 52 (3), pp. 335-357 : 344

12. Amaranthus graecizans L., Sp. Pl.: 990. 1753 ≡ Amaranthus angustifolius Lam., Encycl. 1: 115. 1783, nom. illeg. ≡ Amaranthus blitum var. graecizans (L.) Moq. in Candolle, Prodr. 13(2): 263. 1849 ≡ Amaranthus angustifolius var. graecizans (L.) Thell. in Ascherson & Graebner, Syn. Mitteleur. Fl. 5 (1. Abt.): 306. 1914. – Lectotype (designated by Fernald 1945: 139): North America, U.S.A., Virginia, Herb. Clayton no. 442 (BM BM000051563). – Note: Fernald’s type choice appears to be the earliest, although many subsequent authors have followed Dandy & Melderis in Fernandes (1957: 191) in accepting the specimen Herb. Linn. No. 1117.3 (LINN) as the type ( Jarvis 2007: 283).

– “ Amaranthus blitum ” sensu Smith (1809: 235) ; Halácsy (1904: 36) [non Amaranthus blitum L., Sp. Pl.: 990. 1753].

Remarks — Amaranthus graecizans is native to the Mediterranean basin and beyond, extending to tropical Africa, India, C Asia and C Europe ( Jalas & Suominen 1980: 96–97; Bayón 2015: 330); it is scattered all over Greece ( Strid & Tan 1997: map 267) and in adjacent countries ( Iamonico 2015a). The species is sometimes similar in habit to and therefore confused with A. blitoides but is always distinguished on the 3 perianth segments, which usually become papery at maturity (vs 4 or 5 in A. blitoides , which tend to become cartilaginous). Confusion of the two taxa is demonstrated, for instance, in selected Albanian sources (see Raus 2018): A. graecizans is incorrectly keyed-out in the group of taxa with more than 3 perianth segments in an excursion flora ( Vangjeli 2015); and it is erroneously illustrated with a picture of typical A. blitoides with white-margined leaves in a distribution atlas ( Vangjeli 2017: 123). Unfortunately, the name A. blitum has been misapplied to A. graecizans in some basic Greek floras (Smith 1809; Halácsy 1904), which makes previous floristic records questionable unless specimens are revised. In its native Old-World range, A. graecizans varies with respect to leaf, bract, perianth and fruit characters; four subspecies are currently geographically defined (though rather weakly so), two of them restricted to Africa and Asia ( Bayón 2015). Subspecific rank, howev- er, seems overrated because the taxa do not exhibit either satisfactory chorological discreteness or are otherwise based on inconstant carpological characters of little taxonomic value ( Thellung 1914: 310–311); hence Aellen (1967; 1972), Raus (1997) and Stace (2010) advocated varietal rank. To achieve accordance with the Euro+Med PlantBase ( Iamonico 2015a) and Flora of Cyprus ( Hand & al. 2011 +), Greek material is allocated here to the two accepted subspecies confined to Europe, namely subsp. graecizans and subsp. silvestris .

1. Leaf blade lanceolate, (2.0–)3.0–5.0(–6.0) × 0.5– 1.5 cm, c. 3.0–6.0 times as long as wide............... Amaranthus graecizans subsp. graecizans

– Leaf blade rhombic-ovate, 5.0–6.0 × 2.5–3.0 (–3.5) cm, c. 1.8–2.2 times as long as wide............... Amaranthus graecizans subsp. silvestris