Relationships among the roughly 55 species of Iris subgenus Scorpiris have been studied. A matrix of six plastid DNA regions (matK, rpl14-rps8 spacer, infA-rpl36 spacer, trnE-trnT spacer, trnL intron and trnL-F spacer) was produced from 57 accessions (52 taxa) and analysed with both parsimony and Bayesian methods. Five major clades are identified, of which four have strong geographical correlations, whereas the fifth corresponds to Iris section Physocaulon. In our results, several species are placed with species not previously considered to be related, although, in some cases, there are morphological characters that suggest that these newly indicated relationships are reasonable. For some of the other oddly grouped species, we can only assume that remarkable parallelisms in morphology have occurred or hybridization is involved. Presently, with plastid DNA as our only comprehensive data resource.@en

Preliminary analyses of molecular sequence data from rps4 and trnL-F are presented. The results accord well with previous thinking about groupings within Iris. Several species generally accepted as distinct genera, Belamcanda, Pardanthopsis and Hermodactylus, fall within the genus Iris. Scorpiris also falls within Iris and should not be considered a separate genus. The series Sibiricae could be divided into two groups, Sibiricae and Chrysographes. Iris kolpakowskiana is closely related to subgenus Xiphium, and I. anguifuga belongs to series Tenuifoliae.@en

This paper examines the results of recent morphological and molecular studies on the bulbous irises. The following taxa are discussed: (1) subgenus Scorpiris and its relationship to the bearded irises and subgenus Nepalensis; (2) subgenus Xiphium and the Spuriae -Tenuifoliae alliance; (3) the reticulata irises and their links with the Syriacae.@en