 The family Zingiberaceae is mainly tropical in distribution.The unusual mountainous distribution of "Roscoea" may have evolved relatively recently and be a response to the uplift taking place in the region in the last 50 million years or so due to the collision of the Indian and Asian tectonic plates.Species of "Roscoea" divide into two clear groups, a Himalayan clade and a "Chinese" clade (which includes some species from outside China).