Common Name: PINK FAMILY
Habit: Annual to perennial herb; rarely dioecious (Silene), taprooted or rhizome generally slender. Leaf: simple, generally opposite (subwhorled), entire, pairs at nodes often +- connected at bases; stipules generally 0; petiole generally 0. Inflorescence: generally cyme, generally open; flowers 1--many; involucre generally 0 (present in most Dianthus, Petrorhagia). Flower: generally bisexual, radial; hypanthium often present but obscure; sepals (4)5, +- free or fused into a tube, margins generally scarious, more so on inner 2 or not, tube generally not scarious, awns generally 0; petals (4)5 or 0, generally tapered to base (or with claw long, limb expanded), entire to 2--several-lobed, limb generally without scale-like appendages adaxially, generally without ear-like lobes at base; stamens generally 10, generally fertile, generally free, generally from ovary base; nectaries 0 or 5; ovary superior, generally 1-chambered, placentas basal or free-central, styles 2--5 with 0 branches or 1 with 2--3 branches. Fruit: capsule or utricle (rarely +- dehiscent), generally sessile. Seed: appendage generally 0 (present in Moehringia).
Genera In Family: +- 100 genera, 3000 species: widespread, especially arctic, alpine, temperate northern hemisphere; some cultivated (Agrostemma, Arenaria, Atocion, Cerastium, Dianthus, Gypsophila, Lychnis, Sagina, Saponaria, Silene). Note: Apetalous Caryophyllaceae can also be keyed in Rabeler & Hartman 2005 FNANM 5:5--8. Taxa of Minuartia in TJM2 treated here in Cherleria and Sabulina; Pseudostellaria in Hartmaniella and Torreyostellaria; Vaccaria in Gypsophila; Velezia in Dianthus.
eFlora Treatment Author: Ronald L. Hartman (deceased) & Richard K. Rabeler, except as noted
Scientific Editor: Bruce G. Baldwin & Thomas J. Rosatti.

Common Name: POLYCARP

Etymology: (Greek: many fruit, from capsule number)
eFlora Treatment Author: Richard K. Rabeler
Reference: Thieret & Rabeler 2005 FNANM 5:25--26; Iamonico 2015 Novon 24:159--164

Habit: Annual, matted or tufted, taprooted, glabrous. Stem: prostrate to erect, much-branched, 1--6(17) cm. Leaf: opposite, appearing whorled or not; stipules 0.4--2.8 mm, lanceolate to triangular, scarious, entire to irregularly toothed or cut, white; petiole generally +- present; blade 3--12 mm, oblanceolate or broadly ovate to obovate, succulent or not, vein 1. Inflorescence: axillary, open to dense; flowers few to many; pedicels 0.2--2 mm. Flower: rarely open; sepals 5, +- free, 1--2.2 mm, elliptic or lanceolate to ovate, glabrous, margin scarious, white, awn conic to widely triangular; petals 5, 0.5--1 mm, linear to oblong or elliptic, entire or notched, whitish; stamens 3--5, +- fused at base; style 1, 3-branched, 0.1--0.3 mm. Fruit: capsule, ovoid to spheric; valves 3, margin rolled inward. Seed: several, 0.4--0.5 mm,, obliquely triangular, granular or minutely so, brown.
Note: +- 10 subspecies, all but subsp. depressum native to Mediterranean and Europe (Iamonico 2015).