Syringa josikaea
Credits
Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Syringa josikaea' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Other taxa in genus
- Syringa × chinensis
- Syringa emodi
- Syringa × henryi
- Syringa × hyacinthiflora
- Syringa × josiflexa
- Syringa komarowii
- Syringa × nanceiana
- Syringa oblata
- Syringa × persica
- Syringa pinetorum
- Syringa pinnatifolia
- Syringa potaninii
- Syringa × prestoniae
- Syringa pubescens
- Syringa reticulata
- Syringa tomentella
- Syringa villosa
- Syringa vulgaris
- The Garden Lilacs
Belonging to the same group of lilacs as S. villosa and S. emodi, this is inferior in many respects to both. Its flowers, however, are of a deeper lilac than either. The leaves are whitish beneath, as in S. emodi, and of the same shape, 2 to 5 in. long. Panicle slender, 4 to 8 in. long, 2 to 4 in. wide. Corolla 1⁄2 in. long, 1⁄4 in. or less across the lobes. Seed-vessel 5⁄8 in. long, bluntish at the end. Blossoms in early June. Series Villosae. Bot. Mag., t. 3278.
This lilac was first noticed about 1830 in what was then Hungary, having been sent by the Baroness von Josika to J. F. von Jacquin, the botanist of Vienna, who named it in compliment to her. Wild in the mountains of Transylvania and the Ukrainian Carpathians, it and S. vulgaris are the only native European species of lilac. It is distinguished from S. villosa in flower by the denser arrangement of the flowers in whorls and the slightly more funnel-shaped and purple-coloured corolla.
Syringa josikaea has proved a good species for crossing, with the development of a number of late flowering hybrids – see the entries for S. × henryi Schneid., S. × nanceiana McKelvey and S. × josiflexa Preston ex J.S.Pringle.