Desert Gallery

The Welwitschia mirabilis

Oil on canvas. Inscribed in paint on verso The Welwitschia mirabilis, Nyanka Kykamkop or plant of Hykamkop or Otjitumbo Otjihooro. Stump with a head. South West Africa T. Baines. Sketched Hykamkop May 9 1861. Painted 15 Whitehall Place, London April 10 1867'. A watercolour sketch by Baines of the same plant is also held in Kew's collections, probably that referred to by Baines in the above inscription. In his Explorations of South West Africa, Baines noted The Late Sir Wm J. Hooker acknowledged my sketch and specimen as the first he had ever seen, but it had almost simultaneously been discovered by Dr. Welwitsch south of Loando, and his description arriving first, it was very rightly called after him... It has but two leaves, but the manner in which they were split up led me to think there were four, The gentleman seen sketching the plant is Baines, his ox-wagons featured in the distance. The identity of the person seated behind Baines is unknown

© RBG KEW

360. Doum and Date Palms on the Nile above Philae, Egypt

Among Palms the Doum (Hyphaene thebaica, Mart.) is remarkable for having normally a branched trunk, instead of a single trunk with a terminal crown of leaves. Tt has a wide range in eastern tropical and subtropical Africa, and also occurs in Arabia

© RBG KEW

Art, Artist, Desert, Foreground, Landscape, Leaves, Marianne North, North Africa, Painting

Tripteris microcarpa

Guanikontes in the Swakopmund river valley, Namibia Seed Collecting Expedition 2007

© RBG KEW

Africa, Close Up, Desert, Expedition, Flower, Namibia, Plant, Yellow