Small herbaceous climber, annual, leafy stem c. 2 mm diam., green-brown on drying; monoecious. Probract conspicuous or not obvious. Tendrils unbranched. Leaves simple, unlobed or lobed, palmiveined. Flowers 4-5 mm diam.; petals imbricate, white, free. Male inflorescences few-to many-flowered long-peduncled umbelliform clusters or short racemes; bracts absent. Male flowers: pedicel long, persistent; receptacle-tube campanulate; sepals linear, minute; petals ovate-elliptic; stamens 3, included, inserted at c. 1/3(-1/2) from the base in the receptacle-tube, filaments short, anthers two 2-thecous, one 1-thecous, free but tightly connivent forming a subglobose androecium, thecae hook-like curved in the upper part (in Madagascar straight), connective rather broad, produced (in Madagascar not produced); disc consisting of 3 elongate parts, star-shaped arranged, adnate to the base of the receptacle-tube (in Madagascar disc absent). Female flowers solitary, coaxillary with male inflorescence or not; pedicel long; ovary ovoid, tapered into a narrow neck, tuberculate, or soft-bristly (or finely hairy), ovules many, horizontal, placentas 2 (or 3); stigma 2(or 3)-lobed (in Madagascar subglobose); staminodes 3, minute; disc absent. Fruit solitary, squirting the seeds; exocarp membranous, warted or soft-spiny; pulp juicy. Seeds numerous, compressed, ± oblique or curved, not or hardly ornamented, margin faint with entire, square edge (in Madagascar rounded).
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Monoecious climbing or trailing herbs. Tendrils simple. Leaves simple. Probracts usually present. Flowers small. Male flowers in axillary umbellate racemes; hypanthium shallow, broadly campanulate; calyx 5-lobed; corolla 5-lobed, subrotate, white; stamens 3, inserted towards base of hypanthium; connective broad, pilose, lacking appendages; anthers subsessile, cohering, two bilocular, one unilocular; locules apically hooked; disc absent. Female flowers solitary, usually co-axillary with males; perianth similar to male; staminodes absent; ovary subglobose to ellipsoidal, attenuate; ovules numerous; style short; stigmas 2, linear; disc absent. Fruit subglobose to ellipsoidal, fleshy. Seeds numerous, ovate, compressed.
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