Carex aztecica Mack.

Carex aztecica Mackenzie
Carex fuscolincla Mackenzie, Bull. Torrey Club 36: 478. 1909. Not C. fuscotincla Merino (Mem. See. Esp. Hist. Nat. 2: 467). 1904.
Cespitose, from short, thick, woody rootstocks, the culms rather slender but erect, 5-8 dm. high, leafy throughout, obtusely triangular, smooth or nearly so, exceeding the leaves, phyllopodic, purplish-brown-tinged and somewhat fibrillose at base; leaves with well-developed blades 7-15 to a fertile culm, little bunched, the blades 1.5-3 dm. long, 2.5-5 mm. wide, flat with revolute margins, thick, stiff, light-green, attenuate, very scabrous al)ovc, the midrib prominent below, the sheaths tight, not hyaline ventrally, concave, narrowly purplish-browntinged, slightly prolonged upward beyond base of blade, minutely short-pubescent at mouth, the ligule very short; spikes numerous, androgynous, in 6-10 ercct-peduncled panicles, the lower panicle distant, solitary on a slenflcr scabrous peduncle aljout 8 cm. long, the upper panicles in pairs, shortcr-pedunclcd, the uppermost approximate; panicle-bracts leaflet-like, strongly sheathing; panicles ovoid, 1.5-4,5 cm. long, 1-2 cm. wide, containing 6-12 sessile and sometimes somewhat compound, widely spreading spikes, the rachis hispid; spikes oblong-ovoid, ovoid, or suborbicular, 4-7 mm. long, 3.5-6 mm. wide, with 5-12 ascending pistillate flowers at the base and a few staminate flowers at the apex, the latter sometimes exceeded by the perigynia, the staminate part ver>' inconspicuous, much narrower than the pistillate, the lower scales frequently empty; bracts usually scale-like, but occasionally 3-15 mm. long; cladoprophyllum prominent, perigynium-like; scales ovate, obtuse or acute or the lower short-awned, darkreddish-brown, often with lighter center, many-striate, the narrow margins hyaline, the midvein prominent, the pistillate 1.5-2.5 mm. long, about half the length of the perigynia; perigynia elliptic-obovoid, sharply triangular, 3-3.5 mm. long, 1.25 ram. wide, not at all inflated, membranaceous, smooth, puncticulate, green, soon dark-reddish-brown-tinged, slenderly few-nerved, except for the two prominent lateral nerves, substipitate, tapering to a somewhat spongjbase, abruptly contracted at apex into a somewhat roughened and slightly bent beak less than I mm. long and less than half length of the body, strongly reddish-browntinged, the orifice hyaline, obliquely cleft, rather shallowly bidentate; achenes ovoid, triangular with concave sides and blunt angles, closely enveloped, granular, nearly sessile, 1.5-2 mm. long, 1 mm. wide, very short-apiculate, jointed with the very short thickish style; stigmas three, reddish-brown, slender.
Type locality: Sierra de San Felipe. Oaxaca, Mexico, at 2300 meters a]titude'(Pringle 4839, August 19, 1894).
Distribution: Known only from the type locality.

Carex aztecica is a species of flowering plant in the sedge family, Cyperaceae. It is native to Central America.

It was originally named Carex fuscotincta by Kenneth Kent Mackenzie in 1909. However, this name was already occupied by Carex fuscotincta Merino, so the species was renamed by Mack as Carex aztecica in 1935. Carex fuscotincta Merino is now considered a synonym of Carex caryophyllea.