Origanum microphyllum, (Bentham) Boiss.

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 : 172

7. O. microphyllum (Bentham) Boiss. , FI. Or. 4: 552 (1879).

Dwarf shrub; stems 20-50 cm, numerous, usually branched; branches slender, distinctly 4-angled, purplish, retrorsely hispidulous, glabrescent. Leaves on main branches 4-8 x 3-6 mm, ovate to oblong, obtuse, rounded or subcordate at base, puberulent to whitish-tomentose, with indistinct veins; petiole 1- 1- 5 mm. Spicules 4-11 mm, subglobose or obconical to oblong, white-lanate, 1-3 at the end of lateral branches, forming lax, terminal panicles. Bracts 3-4 mm, broadly spathulate, rounded. Calyx 2-2-25 mm, obliquely truncate, entire at apex, glabrous, densely ciliate at the mouth. Corolla c. 5 mm, purple. • Kriti. Cr. O. x minoanum P. H. Davis , Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinb. 21: 137 (1953) (Majorana leptoclados Rech. fil., non Origanum leptocladum Boiss. ) ( O. heracleoticum x microphyllum ) occurs locally with the parents in Kriti.