Compilation
Gladiolus unguiculatus

Plants 30-60 cm. high. Corm 1.5-2.5(-3.5) cm. in diameter, often dark red on the outside and sometimes internally, tunics membranous and irregularly broken to fibrous and reticulate, red-brown. Foliage leaves (of the flowering stem) usually short and entirely sheathing (then hardly distinguishable from the cataphylls) or with a short blade (rarely 2 basal leaves fairly well developed and with limbs exceeding the sheaths); foliage leaves produced after flowering on separate shoots after blooming, (?1-)2-3, linear to narrowly lanceolate, ultimately 30-45 cm. long, 4-8(-12) mm. wide, the margins and midrib lightly thickened and hyaline; sheathing leaves 3-5, usually 6-9 cm. long, somewhat longer below and exceeding the internodes, shorter above and shorter than the internodes, thus imbricate below but rarely so above, sometimes the lower with blades up to 4 cm. long. Stem erect, rarely branched. spike 10-18-flowered; bracts 1-1.5 cm. long, green, the inner somewhat shorter to nearly as long as the outer. Flowers cream to light purple, the dorsal tepals flushed light to deep purple, the lower each with deep purple spear-shaped marking in the upper third, surrounded by a lighter area, sometimes with a dark spot at the base of the dorsal tepal; in profile windowed with a gap between the dorsal and upper lateral tepals; perianth-tube ± 1 cm. long, curving outward between the bracts, widening near the mouth; tepals unequal, the dorsal largest, 1.8-2(-2.4) × 1-1.2 cm., arched over the stamens and style, much narrower toward the base, the upper laterals smaller, joined to the lower 3 for 3-5 mm., directed forward, curving outward toward the apices, the lower 3 tepals smallest, usually united for 1-2 mm., horizontal or directed downward distally, in profile usually exceeding the dorsal, 1-1.2 cm. long, narrowed below into claws, the limbs abruptly expanded. Filaments 1-1.2 cm. long, exserted 4-5 mm.; anthers 6-8 mm. long. Style dividing opposite the lower half of the anthers, the branches 2-2.5 mm. long. Capsules ellipsoid-ovoid, 1.2-1.6 cm. long. Fig. 13/1-3.