Anemone japonica (Thunberg) Siebold & Zuccarini var. hupehensis Lemoine, Lemoine’s Cat. 170: 42. 1908.
Caudex branched, erect, short, 8--12 × 0.5--0.7 cm, woody. Leaves 3--5; petiole 5--35 cm, densely pubescent, base sheathing; leaf blade ternate, sparsely strigose; petiolules 2--5 cm; central leaflet undivided, ovate or broadly so, 4--10 × 3--10 cm; lateral leaflets similar to central one but smaller. Scape 30--100 (--120) cm, sparsely pubescent; cyme 2- or 3-branched, many flowered. Involucral bracts 3; petiole 2--3 cm, base sheathing; bract blade similar to that of leaves, ternate, 3--7 cm. Pedicel 3--10 cm, pubescent, lateral ones with small, paired bracteoles. Sepals 5 (flowers single) or ca. 20 (flowers double, in cultivated plants), purple, purple-red, pink or white, obovate, 20--30 × 13--20 mm, abaxially velutinous, basal veins 5--9, vein anastomoses more than 10. Stamens 4--6 mm; filament filiform; anther ellipsoid. Pistils more than 180, long stipitate, ca.1.5 mm; ovary velutinous; stigma rectangular. Achene body ovoid, ca. 2 × 1 mm, lanate, hairs 3--4 mm; style straight, short. Fl. Jul--Oct.
* Scrub, grassy slopes, streamsides in hilly regions, sometimes cultivated or becoming naturalized; 400--2600 m. Native in N Guangdong, N Guangxi, Guizhou, W Hubei, Jiangxi, S Shaanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan, and E Zhejiang (Tiantai Shan); cultivated or naturalized (var. japonica) in Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Yunnan, and Zhejiang.
Cultivated plants with double flowers (with ca. 20 sepals) have been called Anemone hupehensis var. japonica (Thunberg) Bowles & Stearn (J. Roy. Hort. Soc. 72: 265. 1947; Atragene japonica Thunberg; Anemone hupehensis f. alba W. T. Wang; A. hupehensis var. simplicifolia W. T. Wang; A. japonica (Thunberg) Siebold & Zuccarini (1835), not Houttuyn (1778); A. scabiosa H. Léveillé & Vaniot). They are believed to have been derived from A. hupehensis stock.
