The genus Cinnamomum

Chinese Cassia 157
Figure 6.1 Cinnamomum cassia. 1. Flowering branch; 2. Fruit and tepal; 3. Fruit; 4. Dissected flower;
5. Outer stamen and inner stamen with basal glands; 6. Staminode.
or subopposite, oblong-oval or narrowly elliptic to sublanceolate, 8–16 4–7 cm,
coriaceous, thick, shining green, glabrous upper, greenish opaque and sparsely
hairy under, triplinerved from the base, the apex slightly acute. Leaf base is acute, the
margins are cartilaginous and involute, the basal lateral nerves subopposite, arising
from 5–10 mm above the leaf base, arcuate-ascendent and evanescent below the leaf
apex. Petioles are 1.5–2.5 cm long. Panicle’s axillary or subterminal, 8–16 cm long,
triplicate-branched, the end of the branch being 3-flowered, peduncle as long as half
of inflorescence. Flowers are white, 4.5 mm long; pedicels 3–6 mm long, yellowbrown
tomentellate. Perianth is densely yellow-brown-tomentellate outside and
inside, the tube is obconical, about 2 mm long, the lobes are ovate-oblong, subequal.
There are nine fertile stamens, about 2–3 mm long; (of 1st and 2nd whorls) lateral
extrorse; the 3rd whorl anther ovate oblong, four-celled introse. Staminodes 3, of
the innermost whorl (Fig. 6.1). Ovary ovoid is about 1.7 mm long, glabrous, style
slender, as large as ovary, stigma small and inconspicuous. Fruit ellipsoid, is about