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Classification
Orania
Nomenclature
SUMMARY
Tall solitary, monoecious palm. Stem naked, conspicuously ringed by leaf scars distally, unarmed. Leaf sheath deeply split, fibrous along margins, not forming a crownshaft; petiole variable in length, densely tomentose; blade pinnately divided into numerous pinnae, these unarmed, regularly arranged in one plane, linear-lanceolate, reduplicate, single-fold, apically praemorse, discolorous. Inflorescence protandrous, interfoliar, branching to 1–3 orders; peduncle variable in length, terete, often tomentose; prophyll included within the subtending leaf; peduncular bract 1(–2), large, conspicuous, enclosing inflorescence in bud, splitting longitudinally, eventually deciduous, apically with a flattened beak; rachillae spreading, flexuous, glabrous to tomentose, basally with protandrous triads of one central female flower and two lateral male flowers, distally with solitary or paired male flowers. Flowers sessile, creamy white, calyx much shorter than petals; male flower with 3–32, free or variously connate stamens, anthers elongate; female flower wider than the male, otherwise quite similar, with 3–11 staminodes, gynoecium trilocular, triovulate, with three short stigmas. Fruit developing from 1, 2 or 3 carpels, globose to lobed, greenish yellow, orange or yellowish-brown at maturity, epicarp smooth, mesocarp thin or thick, fleshy, endocarp thin; endosperm homogeneous. Germination remote-tubular; eophyll usually bifid with praemorse tips.
Eighteen species from Madagascar, Peninsular Thailand to New Guinea. One species in Thailand.