Baker (1878: 281) in the protologue of Bauhinia khasiana Baker (Leguminosae: Caesalpinioideae) cited “Khasia hills, alt. 1-3000 ft., Hook. fil. & Thomson” along with the morphological description.

From Stafleu & Cowan (1976: 104), it is known that Baker's types are mainly at K and WELT.

There is no specimen of Bauhinia L. in Baker's collection at WELT. However, parts of the Baker's collection are yet to be sorted. The Baker's herbarium at WELT consists of material collected by Baker and others in the 1840's to 1860's, primarily from Britain and Europe (New Zealand National Herbarium Network, 2012). So probably material from Khasia, India is not present in the unsorted part.

There are two relevant sheets at K. Details of these collections at K and some other herbaria are given in Table 1.

Thothathri (1965: 131) under Phanera khasiana (Baker) Thoth, cited a list of specimens examined and included in it “Khasia Hills, 1000 m. — Hook.f. & Thomson s.n. (isotype in CAL)”. He also annotated this specimen with leaves and immature inflorescence, having barcode number [CAL0000011245], as “Isotypus (Bauhinia khasiana Baker)” in 1965.

Larsen & Larsen (1980: 189) cited “Type: Hooker f. & Thomson s.n., Inde (Khasia), K”. It is to be noted that they labeled the specimens at NHN-L, P and S as isotype (Table 1). However, none of the sheets at K has been annotated as type by Kai Larsen & Supee S. Larsen, although the determinavit slips attached by them in 1977 bear the name B. khasiana Baker subsp. khasiana in the handwriting of S. S. Larsen.

Zhang & Zhu (2006) cited “Type: India. Mt. Khasia: Hooker & Thomson s.n. (holotype, K!; isotype, U!)”. They have, however, not given a clue in their publication so that one can find out the holotype examined by them at K. No other specimen at K has been also annotated by them accordingly. Dr. Nicolien Sol (pers. comm.), however, informed that there is no such specimen at U.

The choice of Larsen & Larsen (1980: 189) at K, made before 1^st January 2001, has to be accepted as effective lectotypication. It supersedes the CAL specimen cited as “isotype” by Thothathri (1965: 131) because this latter considers the CAL specimen as an isotype, i.e. a duplicate of the type. It must be keept in mind that Baker was Keeper at Kew, and that the Kew collections were, prima facie, the material on which Baker based the description.

As there is no evidence that Baker used only one specimen for describing the species, the type citation by Larsen & Larsen (1980) has to be accepted as the first-step lectotype as it cannot be ascertained which of the specimens at K was selected by them as lectotype. Thus a second-step lectotype has to be designated following McNeill & al. (2006, Art. 9.15).

Table 1.

Details of herbaria collections of Bauhinia khasiana Baker (collections J. D. Hooker & T. Thomson s.n. from Khasia hills).

Fig. 1.

Lectotype (second-step) of Bauhinia khosiona Baker (designated by an arrow).

[J. D. Hooker & T. Thomson s.n., K] [© The Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Reproduced with permission]