Karpatiosorbus 'Theophrasta'
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New article for Trees and Shrubs Online.
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'Karpatiosorbus 'Theophrasta'' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Genus
Synonyms
- Sorbus 'Theophrasta'
Editorial Note
The text below is that of Bean (Bean 1981) who discussed this taxon under the name Sorbus ‘Theophrasta’ below his article on S. latifolia (now Karpatiosorbus latifolia). We have created this hybrid article – Bean’s text under the correct modern name, with appropriate synonymy – whilst we await sponsorship to enable a full revision of this genus to be written. We are re-organising the Sorbus sensu lato articles in this way to enable a new revision of Sorbus sensu stricto to commence in 2023, and to bring the nomenclature of this complex group of plants up to date in line with modern treatments.
TC, September 2023.
A tree growing as large in height and girth as S. latifolia and indistinguishable from it in fruit. It is similar to S. devoniensis, and quite distinct from S. latifolia, in its leaves, but these are not lobed as in S. devoniensis but merely double-toothed. They are ovate or elliptic-ovate, 3 to 41⁄2 in. long, 7⁄8 to 3 in. wide, acute or subacute at the apex, rounded or broad-cuneate at the base, with eight to eleven pairs of veins, dark green and glossy above, greenish grey and closely woolly beneath (S. devoniensis ‘Theophrasta’ Hensen; S. aria var. Theophrasta Hort.; ?Pyrus Theophrastii Hort.; S. latifolia Hort., in part, not (Lam.) DC.; S. mougeotii Hort., not Soyer-Willemet & Godr.).
This handsome relative of S. latifolia was first distinguished as such and fully described by Dr K. J. W. Hensen in 1966 (Dendroflora No. 3, p. 62 and fig. 1). The type is a plant received from the Dutch nurseryman P. Lombarts, who listed this sorbus in his catalogue for 1947/8 as S. Theophrasta. Mr Lombarts’ stock came from a tree at Kew (no. 695), which was received from the Edinburgh Botanic Garden in 1922 as S. aria var. theophrasta. The tree at Edinburgh still exists, as does its offspring at Kew, but is of unknown provenance. It is perhaps of significance that the Lawson Company of Edinburgh were offering ‘Pyrus theophrastii’ as early as 1874, but ‘theophrasta’ – ‘food of the gods’, in allusion to the edible fruits – is almost certainly more correct. Another plant at Kew, agreeing perfectly with ‘Theophrasta’, was received before 1913 under the name Pyrus (or Sorbus) mougeotii, though it does not in the least resemble the sorbus to which the name S. mougeotii properly belongs.
In describing ‘Theophrasta’ Dr Hensen suggested that it was the same as the unnamed, cultivated sorbus shortly described by E. F. Warburg in Flora of the British Isles, under S. devoniensis. Certainly it is a good match for a set of specimens in the Kew Herbarium, from Burgh Heath, Surrey, annotated by Warburg as ‘the most commonly cultivated form of S. latifolia s.l. [in the broad sense]. I have not yet found a name for it. It is pretty near to S. devoniensis.’ There are many other specimens from southern England in the Kew Herbarium, from cultivated or perhaps naturalised trees, which too agree well with ‘Theophrasta’.
S. ‘Theophrasta’ makes a handsome tree, similar at a distance to S. latifolia, and with identical fruits ripening at the same time. At Borde Hill in Sussex, where the two grow near together, ‘Theophrasta’ has made the finer specimen and comes into leaf about two weeks later.
From the Supplement (Vol. V)
S. ‘Theophrasta’. – An example at Edinburgh measures 40 × 33⁄4 ft (1985).