Brazilian rainforest plant for ID please.

Hi,

I was very impressed by the beauty of this plant I found growing on the riverside in a protected rainforest area around Paraty, Brazil. The height was around 1.50m.
The leaves were a silvery green, stems and leaf rims covered in red fluffy hairs, it had a few spikes too along the stems.
It was not in bloom and when I went back a few weeks later to the same spot, the plant had been destroyed by a heavy monsoon, which did a lot of destruction on the vegetation besides the river, so sad!
I would really love to know its name and appreciate any help!
Photos were taken on the 4th of january.

Thanks,
Myriam

 

It may be Begonia luxurians or closely related. It is native to that area.

 

Thank you for your reply Akivari, I see the similarity in leaf shape with Begonia luxurians, which I have grown from seed collected in Brazil. I'm sure though it is not a Begonia sp.

 

Looking at the stem again I think it might be Jatropha.

Cheers!

 

Still looking for an id..
Didn't find a match with Jatropha either..

 

It's discouraging how difficult it is to do a search when, other than flowers and fruits, admittedly what would really be required, there is actually a lot of information here. The photos are excellent, and the description supplies what is not immediately obvious. You'd think that alternate palmately compound leaves, sessile leaflets with entire margins, pinnate veining, purple fuzzy hairs would come up with something.

I found one possibility: Pourouma cecropiifolia - Amazon grape
http://delta-intkey.com/angio/images/cecrop01.gif.
Several photos show simple leaves deeply lobed to be almost compound, but I read something that I've now lost saying that leaves on young plants are compound. I came across this plant ages ago, but kept rejecting it because of the photos of simple lobed leaves. There is a description and a few photos about 2/3 of the way down on this page:
http://www.growingairfoundation.org/tree-of-the-week/

 

Thank you so much for your reply wcutler!!
Pourouma cecropiifolia is close indeed (on the second link and the illustration) if it is a tree instead of a herbaceous plant like I thought, it would have been young and that could explain the differences with leaves of a mature tree, the presence of the downy red-purple hairs on the stems and leaf rims, the sparse spikes on mine maybe get lost by maturing..
Of course we cannot be sure having no blooms nor fruit, I don't think we can get any closer..

And what a valuable informative and greatly illustrated link you gave me, I'm sure I'll find others in there I still haven't identified!
Many thanks!:)
Myriam