Deciduous shrubs or small trees, 8-15 m tall. Terminal buds quite glabrous. Branchlets stout, glabrous, smooth, black when dry. Leaves alternate; petiole 9-12 mm, glabrous; leaf blade elliptic to ovate-lanceolate, 4-11 × 1.1-2.4 cm, abaxially glaucous, adaxially green and shining, glabrous on both surfaces even when young, lateral veins 11-16 pairs, base acute or cuneate, apex acute. Umbels 5-or fewer flowered, solitary or few corymbosely arranged; peduncle 6-10 mm, strongly reflexed. Male flowers: perianth segments 6, oblong; fertile stamens 6, 2-glandular; filaments glabrous. Female flowers in smaller fewer-flowered umbels; perianth more irregular; stigma discoid. Fruit globose, ca. 5 mm in diam., black at maturity; fruiting pedicel 2-4 mm. Fl. Feb-Mar, fr. Jul-Aug.