priority or main target for the selection or breeding, although cultivation for ornamental purpose has increased in recent years. Anthropogenic selection pressure makes this
species very variabele in cultivation, especially the habit, fruits and seeds in the sizes and shapes, colours or even tastes, including other characters within the fruits and seeds, such
as epicarp, mesocarp, endocarp, raphe, endosperm rumination and embryo. In this treatment, we apply the more wide species concept to A. catechu and do not
recognise any varieties within this species as proposed before by the earlier authors Giseke, 1792; Blume, 1839; Beccari 1908, 1911, 1919. And if any distinct individuals,
populations or groups which found within the morphological range of A. catechu, they must be treated as cultivars because they are the product of cultivation. There is no
record of the wild population of A. catechu so far, although Merrill collected his specimen Merrill 9447 in primeval forest in Palawan, the Philippines, but he also noted in his letter
to Beccari Beccari, 1919 that the trees he found and collected originated from seeds accidentally left there by natives. The two varieties, var. nigra Giseke, 1792 and var.
alba Blume, 1839 based on interpretation of Rumphius’s “pinang itam” and “pinang
poetih” in Herbarium Amboinense, and these two varieties erected on the basis of different colours in the plant and reproductive organs, including fruits – more dark and white or
yellow from the common variety. Further, Beccari 1919 keyed out three varieties and one form of A. catechu in the Philippines; var. batanensis Beccari, 1908, var. longicarpa
Beccari, 1911, var. silvatica Beccari, 1919 and forma communis based on the stem thick and short, inflorescence dense and rachillae bearing flowers short, the fruits and
seeds shapes or dimension. Areca macrocarpa
Becc. synonymous with A. catechu, as already mentioned by Merrill 1923: 26. Areca macrocarpa is merely a form of Areca catechu L. with much larger
fruits. This has been followed by Fernando in prep. in his provisional annotated checklist of the palms of the Philippines who could find no other specimen of A. macrocarpa, except
the type specimen kept in Florence. Beccari 1919 in his conspectus of the Philippines species of Areca, differentiated A. macrocarpa from A. catechu by seed having vascular
bundles of the integument arising straight, almost erect, from raphal side and slightly branching, and fruit elongate-ellipsoid, twice as long as broad 7 cm long and 3.2 to 3.5 cm
broad, and also seed ovoid-conical with a blunt apex rather than seed having a vascular bundles of the integument arching on the sides, and strongly anastomising immediately
from its base, even on the raphal side, and fruit globose-ovoid or ovoid-ellipsoid, not more than one-third or one-fourth longer than broad 4 to 5 cm long and 3 cm or little less
broad, and seed subglobose with a more or less flattish base. After examining many collections of A. catechu from throughout its range, including type materials of A.
macrocarpa and all varieties of A. catechu, we find no reason to maintain more than one
species Areca catechu
is similar to the EWL species A. mandacanii in all parts, except the leaves plication and leaflets arrangement on the leaf rachis. See discussion under the
leaves and notes under A. mandacanii for more explanation.
2. Areca macrocalyx Zipp. ex Blume, Rumphia 2: 75 1839. Type: New Guinea, SW
coast, Zippel s.n. holotype: L. Areca jobiensis
Becc., Malesia 1: 21 1877. Type: New Guinea, Geelvink Bay, Japen
Island, Ansus, iv.1875, Beccari s.n. holotype: FI; isotypes: K. Synon. Nov.
Areca macrocalyx var. zippelliana Becc., Malesia 1: 19 1877. Type: New Guinea, SW
coast, Zippel s.n. holotype: L. Synon. Nov.
Areca macrocalyx var. aruensis Becc., Malesia 1: 20 1877. Type: Aru Island, Vokan
Wokam, iii.1875, Beccari s.n. holotype: FI; isotype: K. Synon. Nov.
Areca macrocalyx var. conophyla Becc., Malesia 1: 20 1877. Type: New Guinea, NW
coast, Ramoi and Amberbaken, 1872, Beccari s.n. holotype: FI; isotype: K. Synon. Nov.
Areca macrocalyx var. waigheuensis Becc., Malesia 1: 20 1877. Type: New Guinea,
Waigeo Island, Wakkere Wakre, iii.1875, Beccari s.n. holotype: FI; isotype: K.
Synon. Nov.
Areca rechingeriana Becc., Webbia 3: 163 1910. Type: Papua New Guinea, Bougainville
Island, Kieta, Rechinger 3992 holotype: B†; isotype: FI. Synon. Nov.
Areca macrocalyx var. intermedia Becc., in R. Rechinger, V. Teil. Denkschr. Kaiserl.
Akad. Wiss. Wien Math.-Naturwiss. Kl. 89: 506 1913. Type: Papua New Guinea,
Bougainville Island, Kieta, Rechinger 4182 holotype: B†, isotype: FI. Synon. Nov.
Areca nigasolu Becc., Webbia 4: 256 1914. Type: Solomon Islands, Treasury Island,
Guppy 95 holotype: K, photo FI. Synon. Nov.
Areca torulo Becc., Webbia 4: 253 1914. Type: Solomon Islands, Treasury Island, Guppy
94 holotype: K. Synon. Nov.
Areca warburgiana Becc., Bot. Jarhrb. Syst. 52: 24 1914. Type: New Guinea, Sigar,
Warburg 20 holotype: B†, photo FI; isotype: FI. Synon. Nov.
Areca nannospadix Burret, J. Arnold Arbor. 12: 265 1931. Type: Papua New Guinea,
Ihu, Vailala River, rain forest, 9.ii.1926, Brass 921 holotype: A. Synon. Nov.
Areca rostrata Burret, Notizbl. Bot. Gart. Berlin-Dahlem 12: 322 1935. Type: Papua
New Guinea, Diemi, Onange road, Central Division, 6.v.1933, Brass 3971 holotype:
A. Synon. Nov.
Areca multifida Burret, Notizbl. Bot. Gart. Berlin-Dahlem 13: 331 1936. Type: New
Guinea, Papua New Guinea, Veiya, 11.iii.1935, Carr 11661 holotype: B†, isotypes: A,
K. Synon. Nov.
Invalid names: Areca glandiformis
Lam., Encycl. 1: 241 1783. Nom. nud. Areca macrocalyx
var. keyensis Becc. in Martelli, Nov. Giornale Bot. Italiano 42: 24 1935. Nom. nud.
Description: Solitary, slender to robust palm, tall 1.5
−25 m. S
TEM
2.5 −25 cm in diam.;
internodes closely to elongated, 2 −20 cm long, light brown to whitish with conspicuous
leaf scars, and shiny green near the crown. L
EAVES
6–10 in crown, lamina glabrous, to 250 cm long including petiole; sheath tubular, to 92 cm long; crownshaft to 150 cm long,
green to dark green with numerous black dot scales and reddish green to bright red in some population; petiole from almost missing to 10 cm long, channelled adaxially, rounded
abaxially; leaflets in regularly, irregularly or clustered arranged, papery, 6 −75 leaflets on
each side, from broad leaflet with several main veins to single folded leaflet, slightly sigmoid in basal most leaflets and oblique-acuminate tip except to terminal leaflets,
slightly flabellate to linier with notch tips, green, discolorous when dried, dark-coloured adaxially, and paler abaxially. I
NFLORESCENCE
infrafoliar, elongate, bottle-brush like, to 65 cm long, branched to 1 order sometimes basal most rachillae with 2 branches, erect to
pendulous; prophyll to 60 × 16 cm, caducous, cream to reddish; peduncle short to 10 cm long, elongate; rachillae numerous 12–600, to 41 cm long, cream to green, sometimes
perianth persistent on rachillae after fruits fall. S
TAMINATE FLOWERS
numerous, arranged distichously along rachillae from immediately above pistillate flowers to rachilla tip, c. 14
× 7 mm, triangular, asymmetrical, creamy; sepals 3, united at the base, low, 3–lobes, c. 7 × 4 mm; petals 3, thick and fleshly, c. 12 × 4 mm, triangular, striata; stamens 6, 7–9 mm
long; filaments c. 3–4 mm long; anthers 6–7 mm long; pistillode dimunitive. P
ISTILLATE FLOWERS
to 20 × 15 mm, triangular, congested to the main rachis; sepals 3, imbricate, 10–
