Common Name: PRIMROSE FAMILY
Habit: Annual, perennial herb, or subshrub, glabrous to glandular-hairy. Leaf: simple, +- basal, petioled or not; stipules 0. Inflorescence: scapose umbel, subtended by involucre. Flower: bisexual, radial; parts in 4s or 5s (6s); calyx deeply lobed, often persistent; corolla lobes erect or spreading to reflexed; stamens epipetalous, opposite corolla lobes; ovary superior, 1-chambered, placenta free-central, style 1, stigma head- or dot-like. Fruit: capsule, 2--7-valved or circumscissile. Seed: small, few to many.
Genera In Family: +- 8 genera, 600 species: northern hemisphere; several ornamental (Primula). Note: Based on molecular evidence, non-rosette terrestrial members of Primulaceae as treated in TJM (1993) moved to Myrsinaceae, and Samolus to Theophrastaceae; based on the same evidence, Primulaceae has been treated alternatively to include all of Myrsinaceae and Theophrastaceae. Taxa of Dodecatheon in TJM2 treated here in Primula.
Unabridged Note: Recent molecular work has led to new understanding of relationships in Ericales. As treated here, non-rosette, terrestrial members of Primulaceae s.l. have been removed from that family and inserted in Myrsinaceae. Myrsinaceae, then, is characterized by synapomorphies of dark dots or streaks on stems, leaves, or flowers, short corolla tubes, seeds immersed in the placenta, and -- for woody members -- wood lacking rays or with only multiseriate rays. Primulaceae, Myrsinaceae, Theophrastaceae, and Maesaceae (a recent segregate of tropical trees), now constitute a closely related, monophyletic clade. A more recently proposed, alternative taxonomy treats all members of that large clade within an expanded Primulaceae.
eFlora Treatment Author: Anita F. Cholewa, except as noted
Scientific Editor: Bruce G. Baldwin, David J. Keil, Thomas J. Rosatti.

Common Name: PRIMROSE, SHOOTING STAR
Habit: Perennial herb or subshrub, from rhizome, stolon, or caudex, glabrous or glandular-hairy. Leaf: blade entire or toothed. Flower: erect to spreading or nodding; generally homostylous; sepals erect or reflexed in flower, erect in fruit, persistent; corolla salverform or funnel-shaped with well-developed tube, including anthers, and erect to spreading, notched lobes, or rotate with very short tube, prominently exerted anthers, and reflexed, entire lobes, proximally white and/or yellow and/or dark purple, distally white, lavender, pink, or purple; filaments generally very short, including anthers free, oblong, exerted anthers on generally wide, often fused filaments, erect, generally +- lanceolate, generally +- adherent into a cone around style; ovary superior, style slender, +- exserted beyond anthers, stigma head- or dot-like. Fruit: +- 5-valved or circumscissile, ovoid or oblong-ovoid to cylindric.
Etymology: (Latin: diminutive of first, from early flower) Note: Dodecatheon, a monophyletic taxon closest to Primula subg. Auriculastrum, recently treated in that subg. as sect. Dodecatheon (Mast & Reveal 2007); taxa treated in Dodecatheon in TJM2 treated in Primula here. Polyploid group; species often intergrade; "anther connective" refers to tissue between pollen sacs, especially near base; dehiscence must be determined on fruit that has aged and dried naturally, because e.g., green fruit of circumscissile taxa (e.g., Primula clevelandii) sometimes split longitudinally as a result of pressing and thereby may appear valved.
eFlora Treatment Author: Thomas J. Rosatti & Sylvia Kelso
Reference: Mast & Reveal 2007 Brittonia 59:79--82
Unabridged Reference: Thompson 1953 Contr Dudley Herb 4:73--154; Mast et al. 2004 Amer J Bot 91: 926--942