Abstract: Abstract The present paper reports the numbers of chromosome and karyotypes in 6 species of genus Tupistra. It is found that all species reported are diploid and the numbers of chromosome are 38. The formula of karyotype in T. wattii is 2n=2x=38=38m, and T. longipedunculata 2n= 2x= 38=28m+10sm, T. auran-tiaca 2n=2x=38=22m+16sm, T. fungilliformis 2n= 2x= 38 = 18m + 2sm+ 12st+ 6t, both T. chinensis and T. yunnanensis are 2n= 2x= 38 = 24m+14sm with karyotypes 2B, but they are different each other in the positions of sm chromoso-mes. The karyotypes of T. wattii, T. longipedunculata, T. aurantiaca, T. chinensis and T. yunnanensis are monomodal while T. fungilliformis is bimodal. Tupistra and Aspidistra are two related genera. Tupistra is more primitive and Aspidistra is more advanced. It seems that T. fungilliformis is a transitive taxon between Tupistra and Aspidistra.

Key words: Tupistra