Glyptostrobus europaeus, (BRONGNIART) UNGER

Dedicated in memory of the late FrantiŠek Holý (1935 - 1984), an eminent Czech palaeobotanist, Holý, František, Kvaček, Zlatko & Teodoridis, Vasilis, 2012, A Review Of The Early Miocene Mastixioid Flora Of The Kristina Mine At Hrádek Nad Nisou In North Bohemia (The Czech Republic), Acta Musei Nationalis Pragae Series B 68 (3 - 4), pp. 53-118 : 58-59

Glyptrostrobus europaeus (BRONGNIART) UNGER

Pl. 1, fig 7-8, pl. 4, figs 13-15, pl. 10, fig. 7

1833 Taxodium europaeum BRONGNIART , p. 168 (Island of Icos, former Illiodroma).

1850b Glyptostrobus europaeus (BRONGNIART) UNGER , p. 434 (Island of Icos, former Illiodroma).

1977a Glyptostrobus europaeus (BRONGNIART) UNGER ; Holý, p. 111 (Hrádek/N., Kristina Mine).

1978a Glyptostrobus europaeus (BRONGNIART) UNGER ; Holý, p. 2 (Hrádek/N., Kristina Mine).

2003 Glyptostrobus europaeus (BRONGNIART) UNGER ; Teodoridis, pp. 12-13, pl. 1, figs 3, 4, 11-14, pl. 2, figs 2, 3, 7 (Hrádek/N., drill cores).

Fragments of foliage shoots of two sorts, cryptomerioid shoots with shorter scale leaves, partly adpressed and cupressoid with fully adpressed short leaves, both helically arranged, bluntly pointed and amphistomatic; non-modified cells elongate, usually quadrangular and narrow, quite elongate (15 times longer than wide) on margins and over the veins, almost straight-walled, stomata irregularly disposed, bicyclic, subsidiary cells 4–6, on the outer periphery thickened, forming dense areas both abaxially and adaxially, obliquely orientated.

Incomplete to complete seed cones 14–19 mm long and 9–12 mm wide, obovate to globular, obtuse at apex, cuneate at base, consisting of 15 to 25 scales, scale complexes rhombic to deltoid, formed by connate bract scale (lower part) and seed scale (upper part), bract scales wedge-shaped, base narrowed, apical part mucronate, small umbo, abaxial side wrinkled, seed scale rounded or triangular with notched margin, sculptured by radial furrows, seed scales overgrowing by 2 to 4 mm beyond the bract scale. Seeds 3–6 mm long and 1.5– 2 mm wide, apically winged, oblong, distinctly bent, flat, seed bodies oval, situated in the lower third, finely longitudinally sculptured, seed wings bent, starting at basal parts, forming basal rims, bordering seeds towards obtuse apices, distinct concave sides crest-shaped, descending to convex sides, upper surface distinctly perforated ( Holý, 1975, pl. 1, figs 1-5).

D i s c u s s i o n: The variation of foliage matches the situation described by Kovar-Eder (1996) in Köflach and Kvaček et al. (2011) in Arjuzanx. Some of cryptomerioid and cupressoid foliage types show dicyclic stomata unlike typically incompletely tricyclic amphicyclocytic stomata of Sequoia abietina with a very narrow (sunken) inner ring of subsidiary cells (see e.g., Kunzmann and Mai 2005, pl. 15). The nearest living relative is Glyptostrobus pensilis (STAUTON ex D. DON) K. KOCH from SE Asia.

M a t e r i a l: Compressions of sterile leafy twigs, isolated seed cones, cone scales and seeds, G 8879-84 (KR 271, 300, 303, 336, 337), G 4598, 4614, 8828-30, Gs 96.

Sequoia ENDLICHER