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Aristea
Also called Capeblues
Aristea is a genus of evergreen, perennial and rhizomatous species of flowering plants in the family Iridaceae, first described in 1789. The plants can differ in height between about 15 cm (5.9 in) to up to 1½ m and grow from, often woody, rhizomes, short rootstocks, or corm-like bases. The iris-like leaves grow in clumps, tufts or with few together and from the heart of these upright and often flattened stems arise that carry clusters of briefly flowering six-merous, star-symmetrical, mostly blue but rarely purplish to whitish, saucer-shaped blooms, subtended by green to brown or papery sheaths. The genus is distributed in tropical and southern Africa, as well as Madagascar. The genus name is derived from the Greek word arista, meaning "awn". In 2026 a total of 58 species are recognised.
In 2026 fifty-eight species are recognised, all of which are native in Africa. Eleven species can be found in tropical Africa: Aristea abyssinica (Burundi, Cameroon, Democratic Republic Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe), A. alata (Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda), A. angolensis (Angola, Burundi, Democratic Republic Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe), A. bequaertii (southern Shaba region, RDC), A. compressa (tropical East Africa and Mozambique), A. djalonis (Guinea, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone), A. ecklonii (South Africa northwards to Cameroon, Malawi, and Tanzania), A. goetzei (Tanzania and Madagascar), A. nyikensis (Democratic Republic Congo, Malawi, Tanzania, and Zambia), A. polycephala (Malawi, Mozambique, and Tanzania), A. torulosa (South Africa, Angola, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe). The genus Aristea is represented on Madagascar by eight species, six of them endemic (Aristea angustifolia, A. cladocarpa, A. farafangana, A. humbertii, A.
Blue Eyed Grass · African Capeblue · Tall Capeblue · Aristea biflora · Blue Eye Capeblue · Blue Sceptre · Blue Corn Lily · Rush Capeblue · Aristea nyikensis · Aristea oligocephala · Pale Capeblue · Aristea teretifolia
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Aristea by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts are shared under the same licence.
