Trees, the trunk buttressed at the base. Leaves alternate, grouped towards the apex of the branchlets, sessile, the blade asymmetrical. Flowers large, axillary (ap-parently terminal), solitary, a, subtended by large foliaceous bracts; sepals 5, distinct, unequal, deciduous; petals 5, alternisepalous, free, much longer than the sepals, equal or subequal, caducous; stamens 5, alternipetalous, the filaments fili-form, closely appressed within every other one of the longitudinal grooves of the ovary for most of their length, the anthers basifixed, long, subequal, 2-thecate, glabrous, the connective narrow and projecting into a mucro; gynoecium narrowly conical, divided almost equally into a longitudinal 10-sulcate ovary and a smooth style, the ovary superior, 2-celled, occasionally 1-celled by abortion, each cell with 1 large campylotropous ovule; stigmas punctate. Fruits indehiscent, coriaceous-fungose, 1-celled, 1-seeded; seed consisting of only 2 large fleshy obcordate cotyle-dons, a firm pointed radicle, and a large curved plumule; endosperm lacking.
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