PLANT: Annual or perennial taprooted herbs, glabrous or pubescent; stems usually decumbent and branching near base. LEAVES: mainly petiolate, the upper ones often sessile; blades ovate or reniform to orbicular; margins entire, variously toothed or coarsely incised. INFLORESCENCE: verticillate, interrupted; bracts leafy. FLOWERS: sessile or subsessile; calyx actinomorphic, enlarging slightly in fruit, the lobe apices acuminate to awned; corolla zygomorphic, 2 lipped, the upper lip hooded, 2 lobed, the lower lip 3 lobed, the tube much exceeding calyx; stamens 4, usually included in hood, the anther sacs divaricate with none abortive; ovary sessile, lobed to base; stigma evenly 2 lobed. NUTLETS: obconic or obtriangular, glabrous, smooth or tuberculate. x = 9. NOTES: Ca. 40 spp.; Eurasia and n Afr. (name variously interpreted as Greek: lamium = throat, referring to the corolla shape; or, as Latin: name from Pliny of a nettle like plant). REFERENCES: Christy, Charlotte M. 2003. Lamiaceae J. Ariz. – Nev. Acad. Sci. Volume 35(2)