Clematis rehderiana Craib

A deciduous climber up to 25 ft high, with angled, downy stems. Leaves pinnate, 6 to 9 in. long, consisting of usually seven or nine leaflets. Leaflets broadly ovate, pointed, heart-shaped at the base, often three-lobed, coarsely toothed; 11⁄2 to 3 in. long, about two-thirds as wide; more or less downy above, clothed with silky down and conspicuously veined beneath; stalk of leaflets 1 to 11⁄2 in. long, hairy. Flowers mostly nodding, fragrant like cowslips; borne on erect, downy, ribbed panicles 5 to 9 in. high from August to October. The four sepals are of a soft primrose yellow, ribbed, and form a bell-shaped perianth 1⁄2 to 3⁄4 in. long; their points are recurved, and they are velvety outside, glabrous within; stamens about as long as the sepals, thinly hairy their whole length. Seed-vessels orbicular-ovoid, downy, terminated by a silky style 1 in. long.

Native of W. China; introduced to France, in 1898, by Père Aubert from near Tatsien-lu, thence to Kew in 1904. Wilson introduced it from the same neighbourhood in 1908. It is one of the latest flowering clematises and is worthy of cultivation on that account, also for the sweet fragrance of its pretty blossoms. Its naming has been much confused. When first introduced it was called C. buchaniana by the French; then it was identified with C. nutans. Both these species are Himalayan, and probably not in cultivation. (For a fuller history of this species see the article by B. O. Mulligan in Journ. R.H.S., Vol. 64, 1939, pp. 191–2.)

[Bean recognised a distinct, smaller-flowered form in cultivation, which he treated as C. veitchiana. These plants are characterised by doubly pinnate leaves, the two or three lower primary divisions usually trifoliolate; the leaflets are consequently smaller and more numerous (usually more than twenty). Inflorescence bracts are much smaller (1⁄8 to 1⁄4 in. long) than in C. rehderiana, and are awl-shaped not ovate or oval or three-lobed.]