Cistus inflatus
Cistus inflatus is a shrubby species of flowering plant in the family Cistaceae, often known as Cistus psilosepalus, although this name is a synonym of the hybrid Cistus × laxus. It has white flowers.
Description
Cistus inflatus is a slightly spreading shrub, up to tall. It leaves are green, oblong in shape, usually long by wide, with turned under margins, variably hairy, with long simple and stellate hairs on both sides. The leaves are unstalked and, at least near the base, have three veins. The flowers are arranged in cymes with one to five individual flowers, each across with five white petals with narrowed yellow bases, and five sepals. The style is very short.Taxonomy
Cistus inflatus has a somewhat confused nomenclatural history. In 1786, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck described this species under the name Cistus hirsutus, but it was an illegitimate name since he had earlier used it for a different species. In 1826, Robert Sweet published the name Cistus psilosepalus, which was then applied to this species by many authors. In 1997, Jean-Pierre Demoly identified Sweet's type as C. × laxus Aiton, a hybrid between this species and C. populifolius. As the name Cistus laxus was published by Aiton in 1789, it has priority over the name Cistus psilosepalus, which becomes a synonym. Demoly revived a name used by Pierre André Pourret, namely C. inflatus.In summary, in Demoly's analysis:Cistus psilosepalus Sweet is a synonym of Cistus × laxus AitonCistus psilosepalus auct., non Sweet has incorrectly been used for what is now Cistus inflatus Pourr. ex J.-P.Demoly
Sweet called his C. psilosepalus "the smooth sepaled rock-rose", describing it as "differing from all others... by its smooth glossy sepals", whereas later sources described C. psilosepalus as having hairy sepals. In C. × laxus the backs of the outer sepals are hairless ; in C. ''inflatus they are hairy.
A 2011 molecular phylogenetic study placed C. inflatus in the white and whitish pink clade of Cistus'' species. No particularly close relationship to any other species in the clade was identified.