Pithecoctenium
(from pithex, pitheccs, a monkey, and kteis, ktenos, a comb; in allusion to the common name). Monkey's Comb. ORD. Bignoniaceae. A genus comprising about a score species of stove, often tomentose-pubescent or lepidoted, sometimes glabrous, climbing shrubs, natives of tropical America, extending from Brazil to Mexico. Flowers white or violet, rather large, disposed in simple, or rarely sub-thyrsoid, branched racemes; calyx broadly tubular-campanulate, truncate or minutely five-toothed; corolla tube cylindrical and enlarged above the base, often incurved; limb sub-bilabiate; lobes five, round, spreading. Leaves opposite, trifoliolate, or with the terminal leaflet changing to a tendril, or deficiently bifoliolate; leaflets entire, petiolulate. Very few species are now grown. For culture, see Bignonia.
P. Carolinae (Lady Caroline's). fl. snow-white, with the tube tinged with yellow, sweet scented; corolla arcuate, tomentose, with curled segments; panicle terminal, few-flowered. May. l. conjugate; leaflets cordate, acuminate, slightly pubescent. h. 10ft. Plant slender, glabrous. (B. R. 1844, 54, under name of Bignonia Carolinae.)