Abstract
Roscoea cautleoides Gagnepain is a small herb and mainly distributed in Sichuan and Yunnan province. According to the Flora of China, this species includes two varieties, namely R. cautleoides var. cautleoides and R. cautleoides var. pubescens (Z. Y. Zhu) T. L. Wu. The later had initially been proposed as a new species (R. pubescens Z. Y. Zhu), but it was then treated as one variety of R. cautleoides. In the present study, we found that R. cautleoides var. pubescens was obviously distinguishable from R. cautleoides var. cautleoides in the maximum parsimony (MP) tree. And this result was also supported by morphological characters of these two taxa. So we suggest that R. cautleoides Z. Y. Zhu should be recovered and regarded as valid name for the species.