Byttneria Loefl.

Undershrubs or shrubs, erect or scandent, sometimes lianas, the stems often aculeate, glabrous or with simple or stellate hairs. Leaves alternate, simple, petio-late, stipulate, the stipules caducous, the blade entire or not. Inflorescences axillary, usually umbelliform, sometimes of sessile or pedunculate, axillary or subterminal cymes. Flowers small, hermaphrodite, actinomorphous, pedicellate, bracteolate; calyx deeply 5-lobate, deciduous; petals 5, valvate, the limb concave, unguiculate, lobulate or not at the apex, the apex inflexed and adnate to the androecium, pro-longed dorsally into an elongate, simple or 3-fid appendage; stamens 5, the staminal tube short, the sessile or short-stipitate anthers oppositipetalous, the 5 staminodes alternipetalous; anthers 2-or 3-thecate, the thecae parallel, extrorse, longitudinally dehiscent; ovary sessile, 5-celled, each cell 2-ovulate; style simple, short; stigma 5-fid or entire. Capsule globose, spinose, the carpels separating at maturity into 5 cocci, each coccus dehiscent along the ventral suture and along the dorsal upper half, 1-seeded; seeds ascending, exalbuminous; embryo straight; cotyledons large, foliaceous, spirally convolute around the radicle.