Hedychium coronarium
| Hedychium coronarium | |
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| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Monocots |
| (unranked): | Commelinids |
| Order: | Zingiberales |
| Family: | Zingiberaceae |
| Genus: | Hedychium |
| Species: | H. coronarium |
| Binomial name | |
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Hedychium coronarium J.Koenig |
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| Synonyms | |
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Hedychium coronarium (white garland-lily or white ginger lily) is a perennial flowering plant in the Zingiberaceae (ginger) family native to the Eastern Himalayas region of India (Sikkim), Nepal and Bhutan through northernmost Myanmar and Thailand, southern China (Yunnan, Sichuan, Hunan, Guangxi and Guangdong) to Taiwan in the East. It is typically found growing in the forest understory where the pseudostems may reach 1-3m in height arising from below ground rhizomes and in its native environment flowering occurs between August and December.
It is commonly cultivated in warm temperate and subtropical regions of the world as an ornamental and cultivated in China for use in medicine and production of aromatic oil due to its strong characteristic fragrance of the flowers said to be reminiscent of jasmine. It is a perennial-green, growing in warmer climates but may also be grown in mild winter temperate regions of North America and Europe where it dies back in winter but re-emerges in spring.
H. coronarium is the National Flower of Cuba, where it is known as mariposa (literally "butterfly") due to its shape. Women used to adorn themselves with these fragrant flowers in Spanish colonial times; because of the intricate structure of the inflorescence, women hid and carried secret messages important to the independence cause under it. The plant has become wild in the cool rainy mountains in Sierra del Rosario, Pinar del Rio Province in the west, Escambray Mountains in the center of the island, and in Sierra Maestra in the very west of it.
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Wikipedia