Lamiaceae or Labiatae is a family of flowering plants commonly known as mints, deadnettles, or sages. Many species in Lamiaceae are aromatic, and the family includes many widely used culinary herbs like basil, mint, rosemary, sage, savory, marjoram, oregano, hyssop, thyme, lavender, and perilla, as well as traditional medicines such as catnip, skullcap, bee balm, wild dagga, and oriental motherwort.
Some species are shrubs, trees (such as teak), or, rarely, vines, but most are herbaceous. Many members of the family are widely cultivated, not only for their aromatic qualities, but also their ease of cultivation through stem cuttings. Many species are cultivated for their aromatic leaves and can have additional edible parts. Some species are grown for seed, such as Salvia hispanica (chia), or for their edible tubers, such as Plectranthus edulis, P. esculentus, P. rotundifolius, and Stachys affinis (Chinese artichoke). Many are also grown ornamentally, notably coleus, Plectranthus, and Salvia species/hybrids.
The mint family as a whole has a cosmopolitan distribution comprising about 236 genera The largest genera are Salvia (900), Scutellaria (360), Stachys (300), Plectranthus (300), Hyptis (280), Teucrium (250), Vitex (250), Thymus (220), and Nepeta (200).
The family has traditionally been considered closely related to Verbenaceae; in the 1990s, phylogenetic studies suggested that many genera classified in Verbenaceae should be classified in Lamiaceae or to other families in the order Lamiales. but this trait is not found in all members of the family, and is sometimes found in other plant families.
Genera
The last revision of the entire family was published in 2004. Few of these are recognized in modern treatments of the family.
Kew Gardens provides a list of genera that includes additional information. A list at the Angiosperm Phylogeny Website is frequently updated. Plants of the World Online currently accepts 224 genera. Huxleya has been sunk into Volkameria. The remaining Leucas is paraphyletic over four other genera.
Subfamilies and tribes
In 2004, the Lamiaceae were divided into seven subfamilies, plus 10 genera not placed in any of the subfamilies.
Phylogeny
Most of the genera of Lamiaceae have never been sampled for DNA for molecular phylogenetic studies. Most of those that have been are included in the following phylogenetic tree. The phylogeny depicted below is based on seven different sources.
Some more recent studies have focused on clarifying the subfamilial relationships within the family using large chloroplast gene datasets with largely congruent results.