Habit: Annual, biennial, glabrous.
Stem: erect, branched or simple below inflorescence.
Leaf: cauline, opposite, also basal or not.
Inflorescence: cyme.
Flower: parts generally in 5s; calyx lobes >> tube (discounting thin membrane between lobes in
Centaurium tenuiflorum), +- appressed to corolla tube; corolla salverform, generally pink, lobes < tube, elliptic-oblong, entire or minutely toothed at tip, scales 0, nectary pits 0 (nectaries elsewhere 0); stamens initially curved to 1 side, dehisced anthers spirally twisted; ovary sessile, style thread-like (much wider than filaments), cleft 0.5--1 mm, deciduous, stigmas 2, elliptic to ovate.
Species In Genus: +- 15 species: temperate, dry-mesic tropics, +- Eurasia, northern Africa, Mexico.
Etymology: (Latin: centaur, mythological discoverer of plants medicinal properties)
Note: Native species moved to
Zeltnera.
Jepson eFlora Author: James S. Pringle
Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange)Key to Centaurium
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