The genus Thoracostachyum was described in 1869 by S. Kurz in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. XXXVIII, part 2, p. 75 and based upon Lepironia sumatrana and L. bancana of Miquel. We are justified to accept the first-mentioned species as the type-species of the genus. It is true, that Kurz published the name Thoracostachys bancana five years earlier in the „Natuurkundig Tijdschrift voor Nederlandsch Indie” XXVII (1864), p. 224, but this name is not valid, as it was published as a nomen nudum, without a generic or specific description and even without citing the synonym Lepironia bancana Miq. In Recueil des Travaux botaniques néerlandais, Vol. XXXII (1935), P- 184 and Mededeelingen van het Botanisch Museum en Herbarium te Utrecht, nr. 16 (1935), p. 184 I splitted of the genus Paramapania, characterized by its leafless scapes, small bracts and some, less conspicuous, floral characteristics. The remaining part of the genus is rather homogeneous, as may be seen from the diagnosis.