Bernardia Mill.

Shrubs or subshrubs; monoecious or dioecious; indumentum of simple or stel-late hairs. Leaves alternate, petiolate or subsessile, stipulate; blades pinnately veined (or trinerved at base), often with basal glands, (usually dentate). Inflores-cences spike-like, unisexual when monoecious; j flowers in elongate or contracted axillary spikes; Y flowers in usually few-flowered axillary or pseudo-terminal spikes; bracts subtending 1 y or several j flowers. Staminate flowers sessile or with short pedicels; calyx globose and entire in bud, splitting into 3 or 4 valvate lobes at anthesis; petals absent; disc absent or of minute interstaminal processes; stamens 3-20 or more, the filaments free, erect, the anthers dehiscing vertically; pollen grains 3-colporate, intectate, finely reticulate, colpi narrow and costate; pistillode rudimentary or absent. Pistillate flowers sessile; calyx-lobes 4-6, imbri-cate, small; disc annular or dissected; ovary of 3 carpels, the ovules 1 per locule, the styles short, free, bifid or bipartite. Fruits capsular, dehiscent, columella persist-ent; seeds not carunculate, the endosperm fleshy, the cotyledons broad and flat.