Shrubs or trees, (5–)10–85[–300+] dm. Stems 1–20, branched distally; bark silvery to dark gray or brownish black, often maroon-brown when young, smooth, roughened in older stems; long shoots straight or flexuous, short shoots short to elongate, branched or not, sometimes interspersed with long-shoot segments. Leaves persistent or drought-or winter-deciduous, ?abscising distal to leaf bases and stipules?, ?fascicled on short shoots?, simple; stipules caducous, lanceolate to ovate, margins entire; petiole present; blade narrowly to broadly obovate, oblanceolate, ovate, suborbiculate, elliptic, or lanceolate to linear, (0.3–)0.5–5(–7.8) cm, membranous to coriaceous, margins revolute or flat, serrate, dentate, crenate, or entire, abaxial surface hairier on veins, adaxial sericeous, pilose, hirsute, villous, glabrate, or glabrous. Inflorescences axillary, 1–3(–18)-flowered clusters; bracts of highly reduced leaves or only of leaf bases; bracteoles of highly reduced leaves or only of leaf bases. Pedicels present. Flowers 6–15 mm diam.; hypanthium tube ?greenish yellow or tinged reddish purple?, narrowly cylindric, ?cups hemispheric-campanulate, thin, exterior hairy, interior glabrous, reticulately veined, circumscissially dehiscent from tube after flowering?, 1–10 mm, exterior hairy, eglandular; sepals (3–)5, erect to reflexed, broadly to narrowly deltate; petals 0; stamens 10–61; torus absent; carpels 1(or 2), stipitate, stigmas lateral. Fruits achenes, 1, cylindro-fusiform, 6–11(–13.5) mm, chartaceous-coriaceous, ?strongly veined?; hypanthium tube persistent, loosely enclosing achenes, ?cinnamon brown, 5–10-veined, longitudinally splitting distally as fruit enlarges?; sepals and hypanthial cup deciduous. x = 9.
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