CENTAURY (Erythraea Centaurium), an annual herb of the family Gentianaceae, with an erect, smooth stem, usually branched above, and a terminal inflorescence with numerous small red or pink regular flowers with a funnel-shaped corolla. The plant occurs in dry pastures and on sandy coasts in Great Britain and has become naturalized in waste grounds in North America from Nova Scotia to Michigan. It presents many varieties, differing in length of stem, degree of branching, width and shape of leaves, and laxity or closeness of the inflorescence. Several other species of the genus are grown as rock-plants.