Premise of the Research Devonian assemblages from South China have become an important source of data on the rise of land plants thus supplementary to a scenario historically based on fossils from the Laurussian region and Siberia. Less attention has been placed on assemblages from Sichuan compared with Yunnan and adjacent provinces of China, and their palaeogeographic significance. • Methodology Descriptions of plants with enations, including lycopsids, are based on coalified compression fossils lacking anatomy, and complete our analyses of the Sichuan Lower Devonian assemblages. Compiled species lists for the entire assemblage are compared with those from coeval assemblages from South China using simple statistical methods (including Simpson's coefficient of similarity) • Pivotal ResultsStudies confirm the presence of endemic lycophytes and emphasise the importance of detailed study of Drepanophycus spinaeformis before any conclusions on its global occurrence can be made.•
ConclusionsStatistical analysis of the whole flora confirms the distinctiveness of the assemblage from Sichuan from those of Yunnan, but the distinctiveness of two further subregions in South China requires further taxa to be described.