Bismarckia

Bismarckia is a monotypic genus of flowering plant in the palm family with Bismarckia nobilis being the only species in the genus and is endemic to western and northern Madagascar, where it grows in open grassland. Bismarckia nobilis is widely cultivated in tropical and subtropical regions of the world. The genus Bismarckia is named for the first chancellor of the German Empire Otto von Bismarck. The epithet (or species name) nobilis comes from Latin for 'noble'. In its native Madagascar, Bismarckia nobilis is known in Malagasy as satrana. Bismarckia nobilis grows from solitary trunks, gray to tan in color, which show ringed indentations from old leaf bases. Trunks are 30 to 45 cm in diameter, slightly bulging at the base, and free of leaf bases in all but its youngest parts. In their natural habitat they can reach above 25 meters in height but usually get no taller than 12 m in cultivation. The nearly rounded leaves are enormous in maturity, over 3 m wide, and are divided to a third its length into 20 or more stiff, once-folded segments, themselves split on the ends. The leaves are induplicate and costapalmate, producing a wedge-shaped hastula where the blade and petiole meet.