yho [ 1678 ]
CENTAUREA Jacea.
Brown or Radiated Knapweed.
SYNGENESIA Polygamia frustranea.
G en. C har. Recept. bristly. Seed-down simple. Co-
rollce of the radius funnel-shaped, irregular, longer
than those of the disk.
Spec. Char. Scales of the calyx membranous, torn;
the lower ones pinnatifid. Leaves linear-lanceolate;
the radical ones broader and toothed. Branches
angular.
Syn. Centaurea Jacea. Linn. Sp. PI. 1293. Fl.Suec. 300.
Jacea. Tillands. Ic. 111.
T h e knowledge of our native plants is not yet so complete
but that something new may still be expected to reward the
curious inquirer, even exclusive of the class Cryptogamia.
Mr. W . Borrer has found in Sussex the true Centaurea Jacea
of Linnaeus, of which we have already spoken, v. 4. 278, as
distinct from nigra, but which we did not then know to be
a native of Britain. On the contihent it seems the more
common of the two; and yet we can scarcely find a certain
figure of it, except in the rare old Swedish work of Tillands.
The figure in Ger. em. 7 27, under Jacea nigra,' is the very
same cut with that in Paullis FI. Dan., which Linnaeus quotes
for his C. Jacea; but it is surely, more like C. nigra, to which
also the J. nigra pratensis latifolia of Bauhin seems to belong
rather than to C. Jacea. In all this uncertainty our plate
cannot be unacceptable.
Mr. Borrer’s specimens agree precisely with the Swedish
ones of Linnaeus, and differ from C. nigra in having much
• narrower and sharper leaves, (the radical ones being toothed,
and sometimes laciniated,) and radiant flowers ; more especially
in the calyx-scales being pale brown, membranous and shining
; the uppermost rounded at the top and almost entire; the
rest with a thin whitish jagged pinnatifid margin, totally different
from the black-fringed scales of C. nigra. The plant is
perennial, and flowers in August and September.