Dioecious shrubs or small trees. Leaves opposite, glabrous or slightly pilose below, membranaceous to coriaceous, petiolate, exstipulate, entire or irregularly dentate, with few secondary veins confluent at some distance from the margin. Flowers pedicellate, solitary, cymose or corymbiform in the axils, the hypanthium campanulate or urceolate, glabrous or pubescent, the hairs simple. Staminate flowers 3-many per inflorescence, with 4 tepals, the 2 inner frequently smaller and provided with a terminal laciniate appendage; stamens 8-many, included on the inner surface of the hypanthium, the filaments minute, the anthers (in Central America) hippocrepiform, longitudinally dehiscent. Carpellate flowers mostly 1-3 per in-florescence, the 4 petals soon deciduous from the urceolate hypanthium; carpels 6-many, glabrous to pilose, ellipsoid, the styles filiform. Drupes fleshy or coriaceous, sessile or stipitate on the reflexed undulate hypanthium.
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