17. Syagrus Martius, Palm. Fam. 18. 1824; in C. F. P. von Martius et al., Hist. Nat. Palm. 2:129, plates 89, 90, 101. figs. 4, 5. 1826.
Queen palm [classical name, derivation unknown, but a name used by Pliny for a kind of palm]
Stems solitary, erect, robust, unarmed, bearing conspicuous nodal rings. Leaves: petiole unarmed; sheath not forming crownshaft; blade pinnate, unarmed; plication reduplicate; segments regularly arranged in multiple planes, apices acute to 2-cleft. Inflorescences axillary within crown of leaves, paniculate, 1 order of branching, ascending, becoming pendulous in fruit; prophyll short; peduncular bract woody, beaked, splitting abaxially, becoming boat-shaped. Flowers unisexual, sessile, borne in triads of 1 pistillate flower flanked by 2 staminate, staminate flowers borne singly along distal portions of rachillae. Staminate flowers: sepals 3, connate; petals 3, free, valvate, leathery; stamens 6, free; anthers linear; pistillode with 3 minute lobes. Pistillate flowers borne basally on rachillae, massive; sepals 3, imbricate, free; petals 3, imbricate, free; staminode a low annular ring at base of pistil; pistil 1, large; ovules 1; style indistinct; stigmas 3. Fruits drupes, ovoid, less than 4 cm diam.; exocarp orange, thin, smooth; mesocarp fleshy, oily; endocarp thick, bony, irregularly folded into seed, with 3 basal germination pores. Seeds irregular with hollow cavity; endosperm homogeneous; embryo basal; eophyll undivided, lanceolate.
Species 32 (1 in the flora): North America, West Indies (Lesser Antilles), South America.