Procumbent perennial forest floor herbs. Leaves paired, petiolate, well developed and with the lateral venation clearly evident; stipule-sheath divided into several subulate colleter-tipped lobes. Flowers white or lilac, hermaphrodite, isostylous or heterostylous, terminal or pseudo-axillary, sessile, usually solitary or sometimes paired. Calyx-tube campanulate; lobes 5, ± equal, linear or linear-oblong. Corolla-tube narrowly tubular, glabrous or sparsely to densely pilose within throat; lobes 5, elliptic, minutely papillate inside. Stamens and style exserted in isostylous species, in normally heterostylous species the stamens well-exserted in one form and included in the other but in P. setigera (Hiern) Verdc. (P. gabonica Bremek.) either both stamens and style are included or the anthers are exserted and the style included. Ovary 2-locular with peltate placentas and numerous ovules. Fruit an obconic or globose capsule, sometimes compressed beneath, not beaked, loculicidally dehiscent or, in P. setigera, dividing into 4 valves. Seeds numerous, brown, angular, pitted.
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