Unarmed trees or shrubs. Stipules linear or filiform, only visible in seedlings. Leaves bipinnate, rachis and pinnae usually with extrafloral nectaries; leaflets except for the distal pair(s) alternate, sessile. Inflorescences composed of pedunculate spikes, racemes or 1-4-flowered glomerules aggregated into racemes, panicles or umbels; floral bracts large, concave, tomentose. Flowers bisexual, pentamerous, uniform. Calyx connate, valvate, usually circumscissile at the base. Corolla connate, valvate, tube united with the staminal tube in the lower part. Stamens numerous, united into a tube at the base. Ovary(ies) 1 (or 2), sessile. Pods woody, straight or curved, flat, indehiscent or tardily dehiscent; usually the transverse seeds each isolated in a chamber; valves brownish to blackish outside, not reddish inside; endocarp not forming envelopes around each seed. Seeds usually elliptic or oblong, flattened, with a hard black testa with pleurogram, wingless; aril absent; endosperm absent; cotyledons large, radicle curved.
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