dirtdorphins said:
Hmmmm...if it really was wild collected and possibly named by a nursery, referred to (somewhere?) by your buddy Roy in '82 and mentioned in an ARGS Bulletin at some point (the one Rick found?)...I'm not so sure that the phrase 'true cultivar' is all that meaningful in the first place...
could be that today's 'Abbey's Violet' is whatever dark purple variety some nursery is selling...
A cultivar does not need to be hybridized or man-made. (Is this what you are implying??) There are an incredible number of registered cultivars selected from one individual wild plant. Absolutely, a cultivar can be selected from the wild. See the International code of nomenclature for cultivated plants (ICNCP) article 2. On the other hand and under certain circumstances, it is possible under ICNCP rules to have one cultivar name that encompasses source material from multiple provenances. Not saying I want to agree with this, but, an excerpt from the Rules:
Article 2.20. In considering whether two or more plants belong to the same or different cultivars, their origins are irrelevant.
Of course, under the International code of botanic nomenclature (ICBN), there are no cultivar names, and the
closest rank would be forma (f.). But in most cases, these are by no means equivalent.
