Payena as a genus was created by Alphonse De Candolle in his Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis in 1844. He commemorated in it the French chemist A. Payen (1795—1871) in Paris. De Candolle placed in it the species Mimusops lucida, first described by G. Don; the latter employed this nomen nudum used by Wallich in his List of specimens in the East India Company’s Museum (1858). The famous Swiss botanist characterized the new genus by the following diagnosis on page 196: “Calyx 4-partitus (nec 8-partitus, ut dixit cl. G. Don), lobis ovatis, obtusis extus et margine puberulis, 2 exterioribus latioribus. Corolla 8-fida, basi tubulosa, superne campanulata, calyce vix longior; lobis 2 ante lobum quemque calycis, ovato-acutis, glabris. Stamina 8, tubo corollae prope faucem inserta, lobis opposita, denticulis interjectis. Filamenta brevissima. Antherae lanceolatae, angulosae, inclusae, filamento multo longiores, connectivo in acumen obtusiusculum carnosum producto, loculis subextrorsis, longitudinaliter dehiscentibus. Ovarium hirsutum, 8-loculare. Stylus rectus, glaber, calyee duplo longior, apice obscure dentatus. Ovula 8, ovoideo-angulosa, acuta, deinde ovoidea, ex angula superiore cujusve loculi pendentia. Fructus ign. — Frutex? aut arbuscula? foliis ellipticis, basi subacutis, apice obtuse acuminatis, glaberrimis, superne nitidis, subtus pallidioribus; pedicellis 1—3 ex axillis foliorum superiorum, petiolo duplo longioribus, erectis, pilis minimis adpressis subpubescentibus. —” He placed it between Isonandra and Bassia and “perhaps near Azaola” (“forsanque Azaolae proximum”). Today Isonandra is to be considered a genus in the neighbourhood of Palaquium (a group with the parts of calyx and corolla isomerous), and Bassia and Azaola are considered synonymous to Madhuca. De Candolle, while correcting the evident mistake of Don concerning the number of parts of the calyx, makes himself another by saying “Stamina 8...” (see under P. lucida).