Shrub or small tree 1.5-6 m high, deciduous, without spines, the branches few, elongate, the branchlets inconspicuously puberulous, soon glabrous. Leaves with the petioles to 10 mm long, the stipules subulate, 2-5 mm long, minutely ferrugi-nous-puberulous, soon caducous; blade obovate, acute at the base, acuminate at the apex, the acumen rather blunt, serrulate-denticulate at the margins, to 18 cm long and 7 cm broad, chartaceous, with numerous pellucid dots and lines, minutely puberulous on both sides when young, the costa prominent and the lateral veins prominulous below. Inflorescences sessile, densely fasciculate, axillary (but usually on defoliated branchlets).-Flowers white, the pedicels to 6 mm long, articulated ca 2-2.5 mm above the base, minutely ferruginous-puberulous especially below the articulation; calyx ca 5 mm long, the lobes + oblong, scarcely united at the base, obtuse and subcucullate at the apex, 1.5-1.8 mm broad, minutely puberulous; stamens (7)8, united at the base with the staminodes into a very short tube, the filaments subequal, ca 2.5 mm long, glabrous, the anthers oblong, ca 0.7-0.8 mm long (sometimes inconspicuously apiculate?); staminodes (7)8, linear-spathulate, ca 1/2 as long as the filaments, villous; gynoecium ca 4-4.5 mm long, the ovary pyriform, ca 1 mm in diam at the base, villous, gradually attenuate into the glabrous style, the stigma conical-capitate. Capsule subglobose, with 6 longitudinal, blunt ridges, 8-13 mm long, white. or green outside when fresh, glabrous or nearly so, the pericarp ? reticulated, splitting into 3 valves at maturity, these reddish inside; seeds up to 13 per capsule, subovoid, 3-3.5 mm long, very minutely foveolate, the aril orange-colored.
Mainly in more open areas of rainforest, seasonal forest and coastal forest, also in savannah and steppe savannah, and areas of secondary growth, roadsides etc, growing in a range of soil types; at elevations up to 630 metres.
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