. Studies in fossil botany . Paleobotany. 394 STUDIES IN FOSSIL BOTANY seed-bearing organ formed part of a leaf. Evidence from closely allied species leaves no doubt that the seeds were borne on compound fronds or pinnae, only differing from the sterile foliage in the suppression of the laminae of the leaflets, or rather, perhaps, their modification to form the cupules. Calymmatotheca Stangeri, a fructification of Lower Carboniferous age, discovered by Stur in 1877,1 consists of stellate, usually six-rayed bodies, borne on a naked branched rachis. A reinvestigation of the specimens has confirm
. Studies in fossil botany . Paleobotany. 394 STUDIES IN FOSSIL BOTANY seed-bearing organ formed part of a leaf. Evidence from closely allied species leaves no doubt that the seeds were borne on compound fronds or pinnae, only differing from the sterile foliage in the suppression of the laminae of the leaflets, or rather, perhaps, their modification to form the cupules. Calymmatotheca Stangeri, a fructification of Lower Carboniferous age, discovered by Stur in 1877,1 consists of stellate, usually six-rayed bodies, borne on a naked branched rachis. A reinvestigation of the specimens has confirmed Stur's attribution of the fructification to a Sphenopteris closely similar to S. Hbninghausi (the foliage of Lyginodendron oldhamiuwi), and also his interpretation of the stellate bodies as foliaceous indusia, and not groups of sporangia. There is little doubt that these organs2 are of the same nature as the cupules of our Lyginodendron, but in Stur's, specimens the seeds had been shed, perhaps prematurely. Mr. Arber has described a seed, Lagenostoma Sinclair!, Kidston, of Lower Coal- measure age, which agrees closely in external charac- ters with L. Lomaxi, and, „ , . „....„. like the latter, is invested in a frlG. 150.—Lagenostoma. Sinclain. Portion ' of branched rachis, bearing cupulate lobed CUpule (FigS. I 50 and seeds. Nat. size. After Arber. 151). The cupulate seeds were borne on the terminations of the finer branches of a highly compound frond, with reduced lamina, in all 1 Stur, " Die Culmflora der Ostrauer u. Waldenburger Schichten," Abhandl. d. k. k. geol. Reichsanstalt zu Wien, vol. viii. Part ii. 2 Indicated in the restoration of iSyginodendron in Fig. 1, Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Scott, Dukinfield Henry, 1854-1934. London, A. and C. Blac
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