''Curcuma petiolata'' (also known as jewel of Thailand, Siam tulip, hidden ginger, pastel hidden ginger, hidden lily or queen lily) is a plant of the

Zingiberaceae Zingiberaceae () or the ginger family is a family of flowering plants made up of about 50 genera with a total of about 1600 known species of aromatic perennial herbs with creeping horizontal or tuberous rhizomes distributed throughout tropical ...

ginger Ginger (''Zingiber officinale'') is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or ginger, is widely used as a spice and a folk medicine. It is an herbaceous perennial that grows annual pseudostems (false stems made of the rolled bases of l ...

family. It is native to Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

. Average height . Flowers cone-shaped, golden-yellow, pink, white or purple. Blooms June–August. Fertile

bract In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis or cone scale. Bracts are usually different from foliage leaves in size, color, shape or texture. They also lo ...

s green, coma bracts pinkish white. Leaves glossy with raised veins, long, wide. Petioles long. Pests include

mealybug Mealybugs are insects in the family Pseudococcidae, unarmored scale insects found in moist, warm habitats. Of the more than 2,000 described species, many are considered pests as they feed on plant juices of greenhouse plants, house plants and ...

s. It is widely cultivated as an ornamental plant for its beautiful flowers. 'Emperor' selection is grown for its attractive variegated foliage as well as its flowers.

Synonyms A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means precisely or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are a ...

include ''Curcuma cordata'' wall, and the ''

nomen nudum In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, a ''nomen nudum'' ('naked name'; plural ''nomina nuda'') is a designation which looks exactly like a scientific name of an organism, and may have originally been intended to be one, but it has not been published ...

'' ''Curcuma cordifolia'' Roxb.

References

External links

* * petiolata Flora of Thailand Flora of Myanmar Flora of Laos Flora of Java Plants described in 1820 {{Zingiberales-stub