Arboreous unarmed pinnate-leaved monoecious palms with solitary or clustered trunks, some of the species south of Panama having the foliage arranged dis'-tichously in the crown or head: inflorescence infrafoliar, borne below a crown-shaft; flowers unisexual, not immersed, normally a pistillate between two stami-nates but on most rachillae the pistillates missing on the apical part of the strand; stamens 6, the sepals and petals both valvate or perhaps indistinctly somewhat imbricate at base, pistillodium usually evident; pistillate flowers much shorter than the staminates, sepals and petals imbricate, staminodia usually not evident: fruit a 1-seeded drupe-like small ovoid or globose body with more or less fibrous or sometimes succulent extenor, stigma terminal or nearly so; seed with plane albumen, embryo basal.
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