Verbascum thapsusL.

great mullein

WFO wfo-0000419130 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h

Verbascum thapsus, photographed by David Lazarus
fig. a David Lazarus, CC0 1.0 / 2022-06-14 / obs. 205988643
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by Rebecca Gimenez Husted
fig. b Rebecca Gimenez Husted, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205826875
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by Erin Springinotic
fig. c Erin Springinotic, CC0 1.0 / obs. 205579144
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by mefisher
fig. d mefisher, CC0 1.0 / obs. 205024084
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by Larry Jensen
fig. e Larry Jensen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205570122
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by velodrome
fig. f velodrome, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 204686614
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by Shane Johnson
fig. g Shane Johnson, CC0 1.0 / obs. 204739141
Verbascum thapsus, photographed by Franco Arenas
fig. h Franco Arenas, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 204716478

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.

Confused withby our own model

These are not lookalikes we guessed at. Each one is a species our identification model genuinely mistook for this plant, and how many times. The error rate is published.

Flowering n = 5,435 observations

Peak flowering in Jul, from 5,435 community-annotated observations worldwide. This is a global aggregate, not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres, and citizen-science records cluster near cities, at weekends, and in spring. Where a species has fewer than 30 annotated records we do not draw this chart at all.

Also published as 58 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.

  • Leiosandra crassifolia (DC.) Raf.
  • Leiosandra cuspidata Raf.
  • Thapsus linnaei (Opiz) Opiz
  • Thapsus montanum (Schrad.) Raf.
  • Thapsus schraderi (G.Mey.) Opiz
  • Verbascum adulterinum subsp. seminigrum (Fr.) P.Fourn.
  • Verbascum alatum Lam.
  • Verbascum angustius Schrank
  • Verbascum bicolle Roem. & Schult.
  • Verbascum bracteatum J.Kickx f. ex Dumort.
  • Verbascum canescens Jord. ex Boreau
  • Verbascum compactum Rchb.
  • Verbascum crassifolium DC.
  • Verbascum decurrens Stokes
  • Verbascum elongatum Willd.
  • Verbascum grandiflorum Poir.
  • Verbascum indicum Wall.
  • Verbascum intermedium Léman ex Roem. & Schult.
  • Verbascum kickxianum Dumort.
  • Verbascum lanatum Gilib.
  • Verbascum linnaei Opiz
  • Verbascum majus Bubani
  • Verbascum mas Garsault
  • Verbascum montanum Schrad.

and 34 more.

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.

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