3. Lirianthe Spach, Hist. Nat. Vég. Phan. 7: 485. 1839.
长喙木兰属 chang hui mu lan shu
Trees or shrubs, evergreen. Bark usually gray, smooth or sometimes rough and furrowed. Stipules membranous, adnate to petiole and leaving a stipular scar on petiole. Leaves spirally arranged, folded in bud, erect when young; leaf blade thickly papery or leathery, margin entire. Flowers terminal on terminal brachyblasts, solitary, bisexual, large, usually fragrant. Spathaceous bracts 1 to several. Tepals 9-12, 3 per whorl, usually white, subequal. Stamens caducous; filaments flat; connective exserted and forming a mucro; anthers dehiscing introrsely. Gynoecium without a gynophore; carpels few or many, distinct; ovules 2(-4) per carpel. Fruit usually ellipsoid, both ends acute; mature carpels distinct, leathery or subwoody, all persistent on torus, dehiscing along dorsal sutures, apex beaked.
About 12 species: SE Asia; eight species (five endemic) in China.
Magnolia menlunica Q. W. Zeng & Y. W. Law (in Y. H. Liu, Magnolias China, 76. 2004) is of uncertain identity. It belongs to Lirianthe and is probably the same as an already published species but was not validly published because no Latin description or diagnosis was provided and no type was indicated (Vienna Code, Art. 36.1 and 37.1).
