Allioideae

Allioideae is a subfamily of monocot flowering plants in the family Amaryllidaceae, order Asparagales. It was formerly treated as a separate family, Alliaceae. The subfamily name is derived from the generic name of the type genus, Allium. It is composed of approximately eighteen genera.

Description

The subfamily contains both well known garden plants, but also weeds, such as Nothoscordum.

Taxonomy

History

Early

When Linnaeus formerly described the type genus Allium in his Species Plantarum in 1753, there were thirty species with this name. He placed Allium in a grouping he referred to as Hexandria monogynia (i.e. six stamens and one pistil) containing 51 genera in all.

In 1763, Adanson, who proposed the concept of families of plants, included Allium and related genera as a grouping within 'Liliaceae' as Section IV, Les Oignons (Onions), or Cepae in Latin.De Jussieu is officially recognised as the first formal establishment of the suprageneric grouping into families (Ordo) in 1789. In this system Allium was one of fourteen genera in Ordo VI, Asphodeles (Asphodeli), of the third class (Stamina epigyna) of Monocots.