Jasminum officinale L.

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Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Jasminum officinale' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/jasminum/jasminum-officinale/). Accessed 2024-03-28.

Common Names

  • Common Jasmine

Glossary

calyx
(pl. calyces) Outer whorl of the perianth. Composed of several sepals.
corolla
The inner whorl of the perianth. Composed of free or united petals often showy.
cyme
Branched determinate inflorescence with a flower at the end of each branch. cymose In the form of a cyme.
glabrous
Lacking hairs smooth. glabrescent Becoming hairless.
imparipinnate
Odd-pinnate; (of a compound leaf) with a central rachis and an uneven number of leaflets due to the presence of a terminal leaflet. (Cf. paripinnate.)

References

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Credits

Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles

Recommended citation
'Jasminum officinale' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/jasminum/jasminum-officinale/). Accessed 2024-03-28.

A deciduous, or nearly deciduous, climbing shrub, making shoots 6 ft or more long in one season, and ultimately, if carefully trained, reaching 40 ft in height; young shoots very slender, angled, glabrous or soon becoming so. Leaves opposite, pinnate, composed of five, seven, or nine leaflets, which are 12 to 212 in. long, 12 to 1 in. wide, slightly downy at or about the margin, the terminal one much the largest and stalked, side ones stalkless. Flowers white, deliciously fragrant, produced from June until October in a terminal cluster of cymes, each cyme with three or five blossoms. Corolla 78 in. long, and about the same across the four or five spreading lobes. Calyx-lobes almost threadlike, 12 in. long; flower-stalk about 1 in. long. Fruits not regularly or freely produced, black, 13 in. long, solitary or twin.

Native of the Caucasus, N. Persia, Afghanistan, the Himalaya, and China. The common jasmine has been cultivated from time immemorial in Britain, and its fragrance and beauty have given it a place in English gardens as secure as that of the lilac or lavender. In the north it is hardy only against a wall or on a roof, but in the south it grows well in the open, where if supported in the early stages and pruned back every spring it will make a self-supporting bush. But perhaps its charm is greatest when allowed to form a loose tangle on a house front, as one may often see it in cottage gardens between London and the south coast. Even in winter the tangle of young stems has a cheerful green effect.

From the Supplement (Vol. V)

cv. ‘Aureum’. – This is also known as ‘Aureovariegatum’.


'Aureum'

Leaves a fresh bright yellow-green; scarcely as hardy as the normal form.


f. affine (Lindl.) Rehd.

Synonyms
J. affine Lindl.
J. grandiflorum Hort., not L.
J. officinale grandiflorum Hort

A form with flowers pink on the outside and broader calyx-lobes, raised from seeds sent by Dr Royle from the Himalaya (Bot. Reg., Vol. 31 (1845), t. 26).