Ornithogalum montanum(Liliaceae) is a bulbous perennial known to be extremely variable both karyologically and morphologically. We have investigated the intra- and inter-population variability at the genetic level using starch gel electrophoresis. Within and among demes variation was addressed by a combination of cluster analysis and ordination techniques (correspondence analysis and discriminant analysis). The main conclusions are the following: (i) there is a wide range of internal variability in the 13 populations studied; (ii) there are at least three independent patterns of variation among allele frequencies; (iii) the variation patterns are only partially explainable by geographic localization; (iv) 2 of the 13 demes seem to have originated after a recent bottleneck. The overall genetic variation ofO.montanumconfirms recent taxonomic studies that recognize it as a single taxon at the species level. General considerations about the evolution ofO.montanumare made on the basis of comparative studies on karyology and morphology of this species.Key words: Liliaceae, correspondence analysis, discriminant analysis, electrophoresis, genetic variation, cluster techniques.
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