The genus of this flower is five-lobed,
hypogynous, widely concave, rounded
apices. One or two fruit bodies develop near the centre. The petals have been described by researchers Y. Wang and S.R. Manchester as having "winged" properties, for the purpose of eased wind dispersal.
Gynoecium apocarpous are formed by two alternating
whorls of
stamen and
ovary, as
bisexual flowers in the species
Chaneya tenuis, Chaneya kokangensis, Chaneya membranosa and
Chaneya hainanensis. On the contrary, the species
Chaneya oeningensis has a single whorl of female ovary
. The sepals show
venation with three to five main, subparallel longitudinal veins, including a prominent midvein and secondary veins arising at acute angles. Precise systematic placement has proven difficult, as no specific leaf type has been assigned. This complication could be due to the likelihood that the leaves were not as easily dispersed by the wind as fruits or flowers were. Although the precise systematic position of
Chaneya remains uncertain, features such as its (reinterpreted) floral morphology, apocarpous superior gynoecium, floral disc and oil cells in the petals suggest a relationship to the order
Sapindales, particularly the families
Simaroubaceae and
Rutaceae.
Chaneya tenuis This fruit is a
Samara measuring between in diameter, with an average diameter of . It has near equal lobes, each roughly long and width, with entire margins and an elliptical to
obovate shape. Two alternating whorls of five
carpels form smooth outer fruit bodies between 6 and 8 mm in diameter, situated near the margins of a thickened disc. There are small, undeveloped and possibly abortive
ovaries, but
plant cuticles are unknown. The species has been identified from a number of fossil locations across western North America, with the oldest dating to the
Early Eocenes (
Ypresian) age in Wyoming's
Green River Formation and Oregon's
Clarno Formation. The fossils are also found near Canada's Pacific coast, including in the
Eocene Okanagan Highlands at the
Allenby Formation at
(Whipsaw Creek, British Columbia) The youngest occurrence in North America is from the
Priabonian Florissant Formation of Colorado. Two localities in China are also host to
Chaneya tenuis: the
Yilan and
Shanwang floras. and includes specimens later listed as
Porana cockerelli by
Frank Hall Knowlton (1916) and
Astronium truncatum by
Harry MacGinitie (1953).
Chaneya hainanensis Chaneya hainanensis is distinguished by a wing venation consisting of three primary, longitudinal subparallel veins and two fruit bodies. The species was detailed in 2012 by Xinxin Feng and Jianhua Jin based on specimens collected at the
Changchang Formation of
Hainan Island in southern China. The sediments of the region are dated to the Eocene Epoch, with Fang and Jin noting that palynological evidence suggests an age range between the Early to early Late Eocene eras. At the time of description, the holotype specimen (CCF-018a&b), was deposited in the Biological Museum of
Sun Yat-sen University in
Guangzhou, China. The species name was selected as a toponym referencing to Hainan as the type locality.
Chaneya kokangensis The
infructescence is a
raceme with a 0.8 mm thick and 18 mm long
pedicel. The
corolla's diameter is between 28 and 40 mm (an average of 36.3 mm), with sepals between 12 and 21 mm long and 5 and 10 mm wide. The sepals have entire margins and an elliptical to obovate shape and indicate well-preserved venation, consisting of five main subparallel longitudinal veins. Two alternating whorls of five
carpels (which form smooth outer surface fruit bodies about 9 mm in diameter) are located near the margins of a thickened disc and can be distinguished by clear
stomates and well-preserved
cuticles •
Porana macrantha (1993) • Astronium truncatum (auct., non Lesquereux ex MacGintie, Working Group of Cenozoic Plants of China [WGCPC], 1978).
Chaneya oeningensis This is species is described as
Chenaya oeningensis by V. Teodoridis and Z. Kvaček. It has a corolla of approximately 22 mm in diameter, with petals roughly 10 mm long and 5 mm wide. In contrast to other species it consists of a single whorl of a
gynoecium of five carpels alternating with sepals, and it is relatively large in size.
Glandular cavities are featured in dark spots within smaller resinous bodies in the petal tissues.
Locality The species has been identified in Early
Palaeogene deposits in
Bikaner and
Barmer (
Rajasthan,
India) and Middle Miocene deposits in Europe, including southwestern
Germany (
Öhningen) and the
Most Basin in the
Czech Republic.
Synonymy Much like other
chaneya species,
chaneya oeningensis has been labelled under various scientific names in historical academic literature. It was first called both
Antholithus oeningensis by
AIexander Braun and
Franz Unger (1845 and 1847) Taxonomical literature in the next decade and a half placed it in
Getonia oeningensis (1847,1850),
Porana oeningensis by Unger and
Oswald Heer (1859) Subsequent taxonomic classification placed the species as
Porana macrantha by Heer (1859, 1904)
Porana inaequiloba (Heer, 1859),
Monotes macranthus (Heer and Hermann Weyland, 1937),
Astronium macranthum (Heer, Irina A. Iljinskaja and M.A. Akhmetiev, 1989) and
Astronium oeningensis (1989, 1993).
Chaneya membranosa The species is known from the late Miocene
Sośnica flora (formerly called
Schossnitz in older literature), from
Sośnica,
Lower Silesian Voivodeship,
Poland. It was initially named as
Getonia membranosa by Göppert (1855), then moved to
Porana membranosa by
Wilhelm Schimper (1872) and following that
Hydrangea membranosa by Jie Mei Xu (1985). In the initial reclassification of
Chaneya oeningensis, the Polish fossils were included. Nonetheless, an investigation by Manchester and Ewa Zastawniak (2007) concluded that they represent a separate species. Their study also deemed the species
Getonia truncata,
Carpinus involvens, and
Diospyros brachysepala as
junior synonyms of
Chaneya membranosa. Chaneya ninmengensis This species is characterised as a flower lacking a calyx and possessing subequal-sized petals.
Locality Oligocene deposits were found in the village of Gaoling,
Ningming County,
Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China.
Chaneya palaeogaea Fossils of
Chaneya palaeogaea were described from Late Eocene sediments outcropping at Kučlín near
Bílina in northwestern Czech Republic. The specimens were first described by Baron von Ettingshausen in 1868, who classified the new species as
Diospyros palaeogaea, assuming a relationship to
ebonies and
persimmons. This classified stood until 2011 when the flora was redescribed by Zlatko Kvaček and Vasilis Teodoridis, who reassigned the fossils as
Chaneya fruits. == References ==