Schouwia purpurea(Forssk.) Schweinf.

WFO wfo-0000432322 Accepted WFO 2026-06 5 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–e · 3 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 3 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Schouwia purpurea, photographed by Karim Haddad
fig. a Karim Haddad, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-01-29 / obs. 178348977
Schouwia purpurea, photographed by Fabien Anthelme
fig. b Fabien Anthelme, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 103024992
Schouwia purpurea, photographed by Karim Haddad
fig. c Karim Haddad, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 178348988
Schouwia purpurea, photographed by Karim Haddad
fig. d Karim Haddad, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 178243236
Schouwia purpurea, photographed by Karim Haddad
fig. e Karim Haddad, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 178243336

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 19 botanical countries

Regions where Schouwia purpurea is native: Algeria, Burkina, Chad, Djibouti, Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Somalia, Sudan-South Sudan, Western Sahara, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Sinai, Yemen, India AlgeriaBurkinaChadDjiboutiEgyptEthiopiaLibyaMaliMauritaniaMoroccoNigerSomaliaSudan-South SudanWestern SaharaPalestineSaudi ArabiaSinaiYemenIndia
Native distribution of Schouwia purpurea, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Algeria ALG AFRICA
Burkina BKN
Chad CHA
Djibouti DJI
Egypt EGY
Ethiopia ETH
Libya LBY
Mali MLI
Mauritania MTN
Morocco MOR
Niger NGR
Somalia SOM
Sudan-South Sudan SUD
Western Sahara WSA
Palestine PAL ASIA-TEMPERATE
Saudi Arabia SAU
Sinai SIN
Yemen YEM
India IND ASIA-TROPICAL

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Also published as 13 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Cyclopterygium breviseptum Hochst.
  • Cyclopterygium longiseptum Hochst.
  • Psychine arabica (Vahl) Spreng.
  • Schouwia arabica (Vahl) DC.
  • Schouwia brassicifolia Jaub. & Spach
  • Schouwia brevisepta Hochst.
  • Schouwia glastifolia Jaub. & Spach
  • Schouwia purpurea f. albiflora Maire
  • Schouwia schimperi Jaub. & Spach
  • Schouwia thebaica Webb
  • Schouwia thebaica var. microcarpa Täckh.
  • Subularia purpurea Forssk.
  • Thlaspi arabicum Vahl

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.