Shrubs to trees, dioecious. Indumentum simple, whitish hairs, most parts glabrescent. Stipules triangular, persistent, outside hairy, inside glabrous. Leaves distichous, simple; petiole short, slender, not pulvinate, usually channelled above; blade with asymmetric base, margin laxly serrate to serrulate to seemingly entire in older leaves, tiny glands at apex of teeth or in very small crenations in entire leaves, venation pinnate, with few nerves, latter looping and closing far from margin, veinlets reticulate. Inflorescences axillary fascicles to shortly pedunculate after several flowering periods, peduncle with one to many flowers, pistillate fascicles usually with fewer flowers than staminate ones; bracts minute, triangular, sericeous outside, glabrous inside. Flowers shortly pedicelled, calyx (4-or) 5-lobed, hairy on both sides, hairs papilla-like, lobes imbricate; petals (4 or) 5, c. twice as long as sepals, hairy with papilla-like hairs in especially upper half on both sides, valvate or imbricate in bud; disc absent. Staminate flowers: stamens 5 (Africa), oppositisepalous, or 10 (Asia) stamens, outer whorl with longer filaments, oppositisepalous, inner whorl with shorter filaments, oppositipetalous, anthers basifixed, thecae 2, parallel, opening with introrse or latrorse longitudinal slits, connective slender, apex blunt or with long extension; pistillode columnar (Asia) or pentagonal in lower part and cylindrical in upper part (Africa). Pistillate flowers: ovary cylindrical with flat top, (1-)2-5-locular, glabrous to slightly hairy, 1 ovule per locule, styles absent, stigmas completely split, with long, pectinate papillae. Fruits ovoid to flattened ovoid drupes, glabrous, wall often knobbly because of thickened parts in exocarp and/or endocarp, mesocarp fleshy, endocarp thick, wall knobbly, basally with thickened triangular part, columella absent. Seeds compressed ovoid, without fleshy appendages.
More
Shrubs or treelets, dioecious. Stipules small. Leaves alternate, shortly petiolate, simple, penninerved. Flowers unisexual, usually in axillary fascicles, female ones sometimes solitary; pedicel short. Male flowers: sepals 5, imbricate; petals 5, longer than sepals; disk absent; stamens [5 or]10 and 2-seriate, inserted on fleshy receptacle, outer ones alternating with petals, inner ones sometimes absent or reduced and scalelike; filaments free; anthers longitudinally dehiscent, 2-loculed; pistillode present. Female flowers: sepals and petals like those of male flowers but slightly larger; ovary fleshy, 2(or 3)[-5]-loculed; ovule 1 in each locule, anatropous; styles short, 2-parted, usually divergent. Drupe usually globose; exocarp scabrous; endocarp bony. Seeds with fleshy endosperm; testa shiny; cotyledons broad and flattened.
Home
