Jurassic-Early Cretaceous Gondwanan homoxylous woods: a nomenclatural revision of the genera with taxonomic notes

The homoxylous fossil woods occurring in the Gondwanan continents of South America, Australia, Africa, India and Antarctica during the Jurassic and Ea rly Cretaceous period are considered here. Original descriptions of the gen era and wherever possible, the type material, have been consulted. Applying the rules of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature, the generic names of the homoxylous woods have been revised from a nomenclatural point of view. According to this review, out of 31 generic names used for woods from the given time interval and area, 6 are illegitimate later nomenclatur al synonyms, 1 is a later homonym, and 5 can be considered as taxonomical s ynonyms. Moreover, 9 genera have been used erroneously. We propose one new generic name (Protaxodioxylon n. gen.) and elsewhere we will propose for co nservation, with a conserved type one of the illegitimate names and one of the taxonomic synonyms. As a result, we consider that there are only eighte en generic names correctly quoted for the Jurassic-Early Cretaceous of Gond wana, and we provide a taxonomic key for the corresponding genera. This rev ision is the first step in systematically comparing northern and southern h emisphere woods. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.