Fl. Per.: May to mid, Aug.

Holotype: Nepal, Wallich in 1820 (presumably at BM).

Distribution: Afghanistan to Kashmir and eastward to Sikkim and Bhutan.

A fairly common alpine plant, gregarious along snow banks, moist meadows, streams from 3353-5400 m. Smith & Fletcher (in Trans. Roy. Soc. Edinb. 60:563. 1942) have already summed up the variability in the species, which shows a topoclinal variation in the colour of the farina, nature and colour of calyx, and the size of the capsule, as one proceeds from the N.W. Himalaya to Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan. They state that Primula macrophylla is typically a W. Himalayan plant and that,…... from West to East in the Himalaya, there is a continuous alteration in facies, culminating in W. China in associates of specific rank.’

Primula macrophylla is closely related to the C. Asian Primula nivalis Pall., kinder which it was previously included by several authors as Pax (1905). It differs from that species in the more or less entire and softer leaves which are more often farinose and much longer than they are broad.