Aloes and Lilies of Ethiopia and Eritrea

242 IRIDACEAE
Key to the species
leaves are few to several, usually contemporary with
flowers (or developing after flowering and borne on
separate shoots), basal or cauline; the blades are well
developed or reduced and largely to entirely sheathing,
lanceolate to linear and plane. The stem is terete, simple
or branched. The inflorescence is a one sided spike. The
bracts are usually green, soft to firm, sometimes dry and
brown at anthesis, relatively large, inner usually smaller
than outer. The flowers are bilaterally symmetric. The
tepals are united in a well­developed, sometimes very
long tube, subequal to unequal, the dorsal is broader and
arching over stamens, the lower are narrower than the
dorsal. The filaments are arcuate, included or exserted
from the tube. The style is exserted and the branches are
simple. The capsules are large and slightly inflated. The
seeds are usually many, with a broad membranous wing
(wingless in a few species).
The genus includes c. 250 species, centred mainly in
southern Africa and extending through tropical Africa and
Madagascar, with a few species in Europe and the Middle
East. Of these, 16 species are known to occur in Ethiopia.
Six species are endemic in Ethiopia and Eritrea.
1. Perianth tube about twice as long as tepals (or longer), exceeding bracts (and
at least 50 mm long); flowers white to cream, with or without red to purple
marks on lower tepals 2
- Perianth tube shorter to slightly longer than both upper tepal and bracts (never
twice as long); flowers variously coloured including white or cream 4
2. Lower tepals splashed with dark purple in lower half, and anthers with acute
apiculate appendages 15. G. murielae
- Lower tepals not marked with contrasting colours; anthers either with acute
apiculate appendages or with rounded apices 3
3. Anthers with acute apiculate appendages 16. G. candidus
- Anthers with obtuse apices (without apiculate apices) 9. G. gunnisii
4. Dorsal tepal 2–3 times as long as other tepals and twice as long as wide 5
- Dorsal tepal up to 1.5 times as long as other tepals and usually less than twice
as long as wide 6
5. Bracts 35–70 mm, usually red or purple; dorsal tepal 20–40 mm
11. G. abyssinicus