Evergreen shrub with spinescent short shoots. Leaves alternate; stipules free, persistent. Inflorescence of several flowers borne in adjacent subterminal axils, separate or condensed into a leafy cluster, with 1 to 2 flowers per axil; subtended by several bracts at base of pedicel. Flowers bisexual, 5-merous, long-pedicellate. Free hypanthium tube absent. Sepals spreading at maturity. Petals cucullate, enclosing the anther, distinctly clawed. Stamens long, filament curved, each anther with two small dark adaxial appendages at the base of each cell, not versatile. Sepals, petals and stamens not persisting in fruit. Disc broad, covering the ovary fully up to the insertion point of the sepals, somewhat 5-lobed at margin with a central opening for the style. Ovary inferior, carpels 3, greatly enlarging in fruit; style glabrous, shortly branched at apex. Fruit an ellipsoid beaked capsule, with a mealy layer below the leathery exocarp, torus in middle or lower third; fruitlets crustaceous with a small basal hole and a longitudinal suture on the adaxial surface. Seeds uniformly coloured, aril basal, large, colourful.
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