Vines. Petiole long; leaf blade often broad and large, not peltate, subleathery or membranous, adaxially finely and closely striate, palmately 3-5-veined. Inflorescences on old leafless stems, solitary or fasciculate, racemose. Male flowers: sepals 9-12, in 3 or 4 whorls, free, imbricate, outermost 3 minute and bracteolelike, inner 6 large, thinly leathery, margins usually membranous, narrowly oblong; petals 6, slightly shorter than sepals, submembranous, oblong or rotund, margins involute; stamens 6, opposite and subequal to petals, free, filaments thickened, swollen at apex, anthers introrse, dehiscing longitudinally to transversely; pistillodes usually 3. Female flowers: sepals and petals as in male; staminodes 6, lanceolate, apex rostrate; carpels 3, cylindrical-obovate, stigma peltate, many lobed. Drupes 3 or less, subovoid, flattened on both surfaces, abaxially prominent, adaxially smooth, style scar terminal; endocarp woody, straight, ellipsoid to subovoid, tuberculate-rugose; condyle inconspicuous. Seed obovoid; endosperm rich; cotyledons broad, flat, unequal, much longer than radicle.
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Woody climbers containing white latex in a laticiferous system which extends throughout the plant. Stems ferrugineous-pubescent when young. Leaves ± ovate to elliptic, base 3-5-nerved, petioles usually long, bent and swollen at base and sometimes at apex, upper surface when dry revealing the laticiferous system as a fine, dense network of ± parallel ridges. Inflorescences racemose arising from old, leafless stems, usually ferrugineous-tomentose. Male flowers: sepals 9 in 3 whorls of 3, the outermost whorl much smaller than the inner ones; petals 6 with the lateral edges incurved; stamens 6, variable, sometimes apiculate, the anthers sometimes immersed in the thickened connective, dehiscence longitudinal to transverse. Female flowers: sepals and petals as in male; staminodes 6, very narrow; carpels 3, stigma lobed. Drupes 3, radiating from discoid carpophore, style-scar terminal; endocarp compressed, elliptic to subovate in outline; seed flat, endosperm present, cotyledons thin, flat, imbricate, radicle small.
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