Shrubs or trees, evergreen, unarmed. Trichomes simple and fasciculate. Leaves alternate, simple. Inflorescences cymose to paniculate, terminal or terminal and axillary. Flowers bisexual, 5-merous (very rarely occasional flowers 4-merous). Sepals connate in proximal 1/2 or up to their full length, persistent in fruit. Petals distinct, narrowly imbricate or valvate, deciduous in fruit. Stamens twice as many as petals, distinct, alternately unequal in length. Gynoecium syncarpous, 3–5-loculed (sometimes with sterile interlocular spaces), glabrous; ovules 1 per locule; style subapical; stigma punctiform, capitellate, or inconspicuously lobed. Fruit 3–5-loculed, drupaceous; exocarp fleshy, glabrous, pink or red to purple or black; mesocarp woody; endocarp cartilaginous. Seeds solitary; testa black, granulose, rather lustrous, thin and brittle, with sclerotesta; endosperm copious. Embryo straight; cotyledons flattened, elliptic-oblong; hypocotyl terminal, considerably narrower than cotyledons.
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