Tinantia
(called after Tinant, a Belgian botanist). ORD. Commelinaceae. A small genus (three species) of stove or hardy, erect herbs, natives of tropical America. Flowers pedicellate at the sides of the branches; cyme on a terminal peduncle. Leaves mediocre or ample. The under-mentioned plant is a half-hardy, perennial herb, closely allied to Tradescantia. It thrives in any well-drained, loamy soil. Seeds may be either sown in a warm, sunny spot in the open ground, in spring, or germinated in heat, and the seedlings hardened off and planted out; but it also thrives as a greenhouse plant. T. fugax erecta (fugacious, erect). fl., petals blue or purplish; pedicels conspicuously bracteolate at base; peduncle villous, one to three-parted at apex, the branches umbellate. July. l. ovate-lanceolate, pilose above, glabrous beneath, narrowed at base, slightly petiolate, longitudinally striated. Stem glabrous. h. 1 1/2ft. 1794. SYNS. Tradescantia erecta (B. M. 1340), T. latifolia (L. B. C. 1300), T. undata (B. R. 1403).