Shrub or tree to 30 m tall, supported by conspicuous stilt roots; twigs often stout with conspicuous leaf scars; sap milky white. Leaves oblanceolate to ob-ovate, to 35 cm long and 8 cm wide, apically obtuse or rounded, sometimes short apiculate, basally narrowed into a broad petiolar area, sometimes ultimately trun-cate or slightly auriculate, the margin callose-thickened, slightly revolute, the costa prominently elevated on both sides, more so beneath, lateral veins obscure or appearing very numerous, ca. 9 per cm, nearly straight, parallel, appearing unbranched except near the margin, butting into the obscure continuous sub-marginal vein, the submarginal vein 0.3-0.5 mm from the margin, often drying glaucous above, minutely (under a lens) whitish-striate, beneath reddish brown, minutely (under a lens) white-punctate; petiole wanting or represented by a small pad against the stem. Inflorescence terminal, to 10 cm tall, cymose, ternately branched, many flowered, in bud enveloped completely by a fused narrowly conical spathaceous structure which splits along 2 sides to yield 2 opposite folia-ceous, deciduous bracts; peduncles often stout, drying angled, reddish to green-ish-brown, the divisions subtended by cucullate, deciduous bracts to 2 mm long. Flowers white, globose in bud, the sepals 4, imbricate in 2 opposite pairs, the inner pair slightly larger, rotund, apically cucullate, 11-14 mm long, coriaceous, persistent and altering somewhat in fruit; petals 4-7, membranaceous, drying yellow, rotund, slightly longer than the sepals; stamens numerous in male plants the filaments filiform, free or some inner series sometimes basally fused, the anthers about as narrow as the filaments with 2, 2-locular, linear lobes, ca. 1 mm long, in female plants the filaments broad except at the apex, the anthers narrow, short, perhaps polleniferous; ovary cylindrical, surmounted by 4-6 flat, rotund, padlike stigmas. Fruit a clavate drupe, often oblique, 20-40 cm long, crowned by the sessile stigmas, ultimately splitting into 4-6 valves; calyx lobes erect, ca. 10 mm long, obtuse and more pointed than in flower; seeds 4, black, cylindrical, sulcate, ca. 12 mm long, 4 mm wide, enveloped in a fleshy aril, the seed and aril produced into a narrow basal spur.
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