Leretia Vell.

Lianas, shrubs or small trees with scrambling branches. Leaves alternate, .short-petioled, entire. Inflorescences axillary, much-branched cymes or panicles. Flowers articulated to short-bracteate pedicels, perfect, rarely unisexual by abor-tion; calyx lobes 5, subacute to rounded; petals 5, free, valvate with inflexed tips; stamens 5, the filaments filiform, the connective extended to an inconspicuous-tip; pistil asymmetrical, usually with 2 rudimentary styles, the functional style glabrous, the stigma capitate, the ovary hirsute with a columnar base, the ovules 2. Fruits drupaceous, glabrate, ovoid ellipsoid, slightly flattened, the apex obliquely umbonate, the mesocarp thin, the putamen tenuous, smooth; seed 1, the *embryo with wrinkled cotyledons, the endosperm present.