The Botany of the Tea Plant: Var. Assamica, Camellia taliensis, and Sect. Thea

Drink pu'er long enough and you'll run into some Latin: assamica, taliensis, sinensis. These aren't marketing terms but the names botanists have given tea plants. Once you understand these few words, a lot of claims about "ancient trees," "wild tea," and "large-leaf varieties" suddenly become clear.

Where the Tea Plant Sits in Plant Classification

All the plants we make tea from belong to the tea family (Theaceae), genus Camellia. Under the genus Camellia are many "sections," and the group specifically containing tea-making plants is called "sect. Thea." Ornamental camellias and oil-seed camellias are also in the genus Camellia, but not in sect. Thea.

The most important species in sect. Thea is "tea" (Camellia sinensis). This species is further divided into several varieties, the two heard most often being:

• Chinese small-leaf tea: C. sinensis var. sinensis, with smaller leaves and mostly shrubby; most tea plants in Taiwan, Fujian, and Zhejiang belong to this line.
• The Assam variety: C. sinensis var. assamica, often called the "pu'er tea type" or "large-leaf tea" in Chinese; a tree or small tree with large, thin, soft leaves; Yunnan large-leaf tea belongs here.

So the full scientific name of the pu'er tea plant is Camellia sinensis var. assamica. "Var." is short for variety, indicating that it and the small-leaf type are different varieties of the same species and can interbreed.

How Many Species Are in Sect. Thea?

There's no single answer, because different scholars classify it very differently. Zhang Hongda's system of the 1980s split it finely, listing around 30 species under sect. Thea; in the 1990s, Min Tianlu and other scholars re-examined the specimens and merged many morphologically similar "species," leaving sect. Thea with only about 12 species plus some varieties. Chinese literature today still uses names from both systems, which is usually why the same tree is called by different names in different articles.

The Yunnan Province Ancient Tea Tree Survey and Registration Code, issued in 2023 by the Yunnan Forestry and Grassland Bureau and two other bodies, includes in its appendix the list of sect. Thea taxa used when surveying ancient tea trees, including:

There are also Guangxi tea, large-bract tea, ribbed tea, hairy-leaf tea, Fangcheng tea, membranous-leaf tea, and others, a dozen or so names in all. In other words, not every "old tree that looks like a tea tree" on a Yunnan mountain is necessarily the pu'er tea type.

Is Camellia taliensis Tea?

Camellia taliensis (Dali tea) is another independent species in sect. Thea, distributed mainly in western and southwestern Yunnan and northern Myanmar, and many big trees called "wild tea king trees" have been identified as C. taliensis. It's a close relative of the pu'er tea type; its flowers usually have a 5-chambered ovary and a 5-lobed style, unlike the 3 chambers and 3 lobes common in the pu'er type, one of the clues botanists use to tell them apart.

Botanically, C. taliensis is indeed a "sect. Thea plant," and locals have a tradition of picking it to make tea; but it isn't C. sinensis. Research has also found gene flow between C. taliensis and cultivated large-leaf tea, and in some Yunnan ancient gardens the two grow mixed together. As for whether it can be used as pu'er raw material, see Wild Tea: The "Teas" That Aren't C. sinensis.

Is Indian Assam Tea the Same as Yunnan Large-Leaf?

They share the name assamica, but they're not the same group. In 2016, Meegahakumbura and colleagues analyzed 392 tea plant samples from China and India using 23 nuclear microsatellite markers and found that cultivated tea plants clearly fall into three groups: Chinese small-leaf tea, Chinese Assam tea (the Yunnan large-leaf line), and Indian Assam tea, with clear differences between them; the authors suggested they may have been domesticated independently in three different areas.

In other words, Yunnan large-leaf and Indian Assam tea are two families under the same variety, similar in appearance but each with its own genetic history. In the 1920s, Taiwan imported Assam tea seeds from India and planted them around Sun Moon Lake in Yuchi; those are descendants of the Indian branch.

What Good Are Scientific Names to Tea Drinkers?

• Understanding labels and research: When an article says var. assamica, it means large-leaf tea; when it says C. taliensis, it means Dali tea.
• Understanding what "wild" means: Many big trees deep in the mountains aren't botanically the pu'er tea type, and their taste and composition may differ too.
• Knowing what the national standard is talking about: Pu'er's national standard limits raw material to "sun-dried tea of Yunnan large-leaf varieties," meaning fresh leaves of this variety; see Pu'er's National Standard and Geographical Indication.

For the look and flavor of large-leaf tea, continue with Yunnan Large-Leaf Tea: The Leaf Behind Pu'er; the three types of ancient tea tree, wild, transitional, and cultivated, are in Wild, Transitional, and Cultivated Types.

FAQ

What is the scientific name of the pu'er tea plant? Camellia sinensis var. assamica, the Assam variety of tea, often called the pu'er tea type or Yunnan large-leaf tea in Chinese.

Is Camellia taliensis pu'er? C. taliensis (Dali tea) is another species in sect. Thea, not the pu'er tea type; it's a sect. Thea plant, but the raw material in pu'er's national standard is Yunnan large-leaf tea.

How many species are in sect. Thea? It depends on the classification system: the finer system lists around 30, the merged system about 12 species plus varieties; the list in Yunnan's 2023 ancient tea tree survey code has a dozen or so names.

Is Indian Assam tea the same as Yunnan large-leaf? Both are var. assamica, but genetic research shows they're different populations, possibly domesticated independently in different areas.