Herbaceous to woody perennials or small shrubs, glabrous or pubescent. Leaves alternate or opposite, often succulent. Flowers bisexual, dioecious, or polygamodioecious, axillary, solitary or paired, sessile, rarely minutely bibracteolate. Perianth tube flat to cup-shaped, greatly expanding in fruit; lobes 5, usually deeply divided opposite radicle, the division sometimes extending down the tube (radicular split). Stamens 5, glabrous, exserted. Stigmas 2 or 3, slender. Fruiting perianth spongy, leathery, crustaceous or woody; tube saucer-shaped to globular, developing a horizontal papery or rarely woody wing or 5 separate wings which grow from base of each lobe; in some species accessory wings formed at base or side of tube; perianth lobes usually horizontal and obscuring utricle, rarely erect, occasionally developing erect appendages or emergences. Utricle discoid to globular; pericarp membranous to crustaceous; style weak or firm or becoming massive and hemispherical to conical. Seed horizontal; embryo circular to horseshoe-shaped; radicle enclosed to centrifugal; perisperm copious, central.
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