page_title: Lilioid monocots
section_title: Petrosaviales
hierarchical_section_title: Lilioid monocots / Taxonomy / Subdivision / Petrosaviales
context_page_description: Lilioid monocots is an informal name used for a grade of five monocot orders in which the majority of species have flowers with relatively large, coloured tepals. This characteristic is similar to that found in lilies. Petaloid monocots refers to the flowers having tepals which all resemble petals. The taxonomic terms Lilianae or Liliiflorae have also been applied to this assemblage at various times. From the early nineteenth century many of the species in this group of plants were put into a very broadly defined family, Liliaceae sensu lato or s.l. These classification systems are still found in many books and other sources. Within the monocots the Liliaceae s.l. were distinguished from the Glumaceae.
  The development of molecular phylogenetics, cladistic theory and phylogenetic methods in the 1990s resulted in a dismemberment of the Liliaceae and its subsequent redistribution across three lilioid orders. Subsequent work has shown that two other more recently recognized orders, Petrosaviales and Pandanales also segregate with this group, resulting in the modern concept of five constituent orders within the lilioid monocot assemblage.
context_section_description: Petrosaviales are a very small order (1 family, 2 genera, about 5 species) of rare leafless achlorophyllous, mycoheterotrophic plants found in dark montane rainforests in Japan, China, Southeast Asia and Borneo. They are characterized by having bracteate racemes, pedicellate flowers, six persistent tepals, septal nectaries, three almost distinct carpels, simultaneous microsporogenesis, monosulcate pollen, and follicular fruit.
caption: Dioscorea balcanica
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