Kigelianthe of Madagascar is not separable from Fernandoa of continental Africa. The two genera seem to have been maintained separate as the result of a combination of historical accident and botanical provincialism. In fact the affinity of Kigelianthe with Fernandoa has never even been mentioned in the literature. A brief history of the situation may help in its clarification. Fernandoa (sphalm Ferdinandia) was described by Seemann in 1865 as a new genus of Tecomeae with the single species F. superba based on a collection of Welwitsch from Angola. In 1870 Seemann described a second species from East Africa as F. magnifica (sphalm Ferdinandoa) and in 1911 Gilg and Mildbraed described a third species from the Belgian Congo (Zaire) as Ferdinandia adolfifriderici. A fourth species, Ferdinandia mortehani De Wild, is probably not distinct from F. adolfi-friderici. The plethora of mispellings of Fernandoa (Ferdinandia, Ferdinandoa, Ferdinandia, Ferdlinanda, Ferdinandio, Ferdinandi), including that of the original description, is discussed by Milne-Redhead (1949) who also pointed out that the corrected spelling of the genus means the combination Fernandoa ferdinandi, based on Welwitsch's Bignonia ferdinandi, is not a tautonym and should be adopted for the type species. Sillans (1951, 1953) later described Tisserantodendron as a new genus of Central African Bignoniaceae with two species, one from Gabon and one from Oubangui-Chari (Central African Republic). Heine (1964) discovered that Sillans' genus was synonymous with Fernandoa and its two species synonymous with the two Equatorial African Fernandoa species. Meanwhile Baker (1881) had discovered a new species of Bignoniaceae from Madagascar in a collection of plants made by L. Kitching. He described it, in the absence of fruit, in the indehiscent-fruited tribe Crescentieae as Kigelia