Commiphora Jacq. (Burseraceae )-Englerian Species which disappear

Abstract

In attempting to revise any part of Commiphora many difficulties arise. These are in part due to the nature of the plants and the difficulty of obtaining complete material showing male and female (or hermaphrodite) flowers, leaves, fruit and bark; in part to the destruction of many types in the air raid on Berlin in 1943; and in part to the practice of describing species from inadequate, often sterile, material adopted by both the two chief workers on the genus, A. Engler and E. Chiovenda. A fourth type of difficulty is that certain names published by Engler simply disappear and are not mentioned in works where they would normally be expected to occur.