Asparagaceae (), known as the asparagus family, is a

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (). The term angiosperm is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek words (; 'container, vessel') and (; 'seed'), meaning that the seeds are enclosed with ...

s, placed in the

order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * A socio-political or established or existing order, e.g. World order, Ancien Regime, Pax Britannica * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood ...

Asparagales Asparagales (asparagoid lilies) are a diverse order of flowering plants in the monocots. Under the APG IV system of flowering plant classification, Asparagales are the largest order of monocots with 14 families, 1,122 genera, and about 36,00 ...

of the

monocot Monocotyledons (), commonly referred to as monocots, (Lilianae ''sensu'' Chase & Reveal) are flowering plants whose seeds contain only one Embryo#Plant embryos, embryonic leaf, or cotyledon. A monocot taxon has been in use for several decades, but ...

s. The family name is based on the edible garden asparagus, ''

Asparagus officinalis Asparagus (''Asparagus officinalis'') is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus ''Asparagus (genus), Asparagus'' native to Eurasia. Widely cultivated as a vegetable crop, its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. Description ...

''. This family includes both common garden plants as well as common houseplants. The garden plants include

asparagus Asparagus (''Asparagus officinalis'') is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus ''Asparagus (genus), Asparagus'' native to Eurasia. Widely cultivated as a vegetable crop, its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. Description ...

yucca ''Yucca'' ( , YUCK-uh) is both the scientific name and common name for a genus native to North America from Panama to southern Canada. It contains 50 accepted species. In addition to yucca, they are also known as Adam's needle or Spanish-bayon ...

, bluebell,

lily of the valley Lily of the valley (''Convallaria majalis'' ), sometimes written lily-of-the-valley, is a woodland flowering plant with sweetly scented, pendent, bell-shaped white flowers borne in sprays in spring. It is native throughout the cool temperate No ...

, and

hosta ''Hosta'' (, synonym (taxonomy), syn. ''Funkia'') is a genus of plants commonly known as hostas, plantain lilies and occasionally by the Japanese name gibōshi. Hostas are widely cultivated as shade-tolerant foliage plants. The genus is placed ...

, and the houseplants include snake plant, corn cane, spider plant, and plumosus fern. The Asparagaceae is a morphologically heterogenous family with the included species varying widely in their appearance and growth form. It has a

cosmopolitan distribution In biogeography, a cosmopolitan distribution is the range of a taxon that extends across most or all of the surface of the Earth, in appropriate habitats; most cosmopolitan species are known to be highly adaptable to a range of climatic and en ...

, with genera and species contained in the family native to all continents except

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. ...

Taxonomy

Early taxonomy

The plant family Asparagaceae was first named, described, and published in

Genera Plantarum ''Genera Plantarum'' is a publication of Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778). The first edition was issued in Leiden, 1737. The fifth edition served as a complementary volume to ''Species Plantarum'' (1753). Article 13 of the Internat ...

in 1789 by the French botanist

Antoine Laurent de Jussieu Antoine Laurent de Jussieu (; 12 April 1748 – 17 September 1836) was a French botanist, notable as the first to publish a natural classification of flowering plants; much of his system remains in use today. His classification was based on an e ...

, who is particularly noted for his work in developing the concept of plant families. From the time of first introduction until the 21st century, the Asparagaceae was a monotypic family containing only the single genus, ''

Asparagus Asparagus (''Asparagus officinalis'') is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus ''Asparagus (genus), Asparagus'' native to Eurasia. Widely cultivated as a vegetable crop, its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. Description ...

'', after which the family was named.

Asparagaceae under the APG II system

In 2003, the formation of the APG II plant classification system radically expanded the Asparagaceae to include the genera and species previously contained in seven plant families. In the APG II system, two options were provided as to the circumscription of the family, with Asparagaceae ''sensu lato'' (meaning ''in the wider sense'') being the broader circumscription of the family documented in the APG II; or, Asparagaceae ''sensu stricto'' (meaning ''in the strict sense'') consisting of only ''Asparagus'' and ''

Hemiphylacus ''Hemiphylacus'' is a genus of flowering plants endemic to Mexico. In the APG III classification system, it is placed in the family Asparagaceae, subfamily Asparagoideae (formerly the family Asparagaceae ''sensu stricto ''Sensu'' is a Latin w ...

.'' If opting to use Asparagaceae ''sensu lato'', the paper outlining the APG II system recommended placing the previously recognised family in parentheses after Asparagaceae.'''' The paper also recommended including grouping the families Anemarrhenaceae, Anthericaeae, Behniaceae and Herreriaceae with the Agavaceae, noting that in 2000, the Convallariaceae, Dracaenaceae, Eriospermaceae and Nolinaceae had been grouped together in the Ruscaceae.''''

Asparagaceae under the APG III system

In 2009, botanists proposed a major revision of the

order of plants, that included a vast expansion of three constituent plant families; the

Amaryllidaceae The Amaryllidaceae are a family of herbaceous, mainly perennial and bulbous (rarely rhizomatous) flowering plants in the monocot order Asparagales. The family takes its name from the genus '' Amaryllis'' and is commonly known as the amaryl ...

, Asparagaceae and

Xanthorrhoeaceae ''Xanthorrhoea'' () is a genus of about 30 species of succulent flowering plants in the family Asphodelaceae. They are endemic to Australia. Common names for the plants include grasstree, grass gum-tree (for resin-yielding species), kangaroo ta ...

, to include large number of genera in former plant families by placing them into subfamilies nested within these three plant families. Under the APG III system, the Asparagaceae contain seven subfamilies, and unlike the APG II system, Asparagaceae was only circumscribed in the broad sense (''sensu lato''), but the Asparagaceae subfamily

Asparagoideae Asparagoideae is a subfamily of monocot flowering plants in the family Asparagaceae, order Asparagales, according to the APG III system of 2009. The subfamily name is derived from the generic name of the type genus, ''Asparagus''. The group ha ...

is roughly equivalent to Asparagaceae (sensu stricto) under the APG II system. Whilst the subfamilies are broadly equivalent to the previous subdivision by families under the APG II system, genera previously included in one previously recognised family may have moved to another subfamily under the APG III system, or even placed into another family outside of the Asparagaceae.

Genera

As of November 2024, the Asparagaceae includes about 119 genera; and these genera contain approximately 3,170 accepted species altogether, although the number of accepted genera and their constituent species varies depending on authority and changes with time. The reference against the subfamily name is to the source which places the genus in that subfamily.

Obsolete genera or species formerly included in the Asparagaceae

''Calibanus'' was a former genus that was placed in the Asparagaceae (Nolinoideae subfamily) when the APG III system was introduced.' Both members of the genus have since been transferred to the genus ''Beaucarnea'' (also a member of the Asparagaceae (Nolinoideae subfamily)) after molecular phylogenetic research demonstrated a strong phylogenetic relationship with species of ''Beaucarnea.'' ''Sansevieria'' was a long recognised genus belonging to the Nolinoideae subfamily but on the basis of

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

studies, the species formerly including as belonging to the genus have been transferred to the genus ''Dracaena'' (also included in the Noliniodeae subfamily).

References

Bibliography

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