7145.000 Lippia L.

Erect shrubs, subshrubs or perennial herbs. Leaves opposite or in whorls of 3-4. Flowers small, sessile, in mostly pedunculate dense heads or spikes which sometimes elongate in fruit, 1-several heads per axil; each flower supported by a bract. Corolla white, greenish or creamy yellow; tube cylindric or funnel-shaped; limb ± 2-lipped. Stamens 4. Ovary 2-locular. Fruit dry, surrounded by the appressed calyx, separating into 2 pyrenes when mature.

Derivation of name: after A. Lippi (1678-1705) a French naturalist with Italian origins

Worldwide: c. 200 species in tropical America and Africa

Burundi: 4 taxa.