Shrubs or trees; monoecious; latex scanty. Leaves alternate, entire; petiolate; exstipulate; pinnately veined. Inflorescence a terminal cluster (reduced cyme) with 1 or 2 pistillate and several staminate flowers; flowers with calyx perulate in bud, rupturing into 2 or 3 valvate segments; petals 6-13, narrow, sericeous, exceed-ing the calyx. Staminate flowers with persistent calyx; disc dissected into segments; stamens numerous (ca 30 to over 100), the filaments free; pollen grains globose, inaperturate, exine with massive hexagonal processes; pistillode absent. Pistillate flowers with stout pedicels; calyx deciduous; disc deeply lobed; ovary of 3 carpels, sericeous, the ovules 1 per locule, the styles short, thick, reflexed, bifid. Fruits capsular; seeds ecarunculate, the endosperm copious.
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