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Trees, often of large size, or rarely shrublets. Leaves imparipinnate, rarely 3-foliolate or 1-foliolate. Flowers unisexual (plants dioecious) in cymes or cymose panicles. Calyx cupuliform with 5 minute teeth, or deeply lobed with 5 deltate or circular lobes. Petals 5, free, imbricate. Filaments 10, completely united to form a staminal tube bearing the anthers on its ± entire margin or united only in the lower half and then anthers inserted between a pair of deltate appendages; anthers glabrous. Disk completely fused to the base of the staminal tube or cup-shaped and free from it. Ovary small, with 2–4 locules, each with 2 collateral or superposed ovules; style elongate, much longer than the ovary, distally expanded to form a capitate or annular style-head surmounted by a lobed stigmatic area. Pistillode similar to the gynoecium but narrower, usually with vestigial ovules. Fruit a loculicidal capsule with (2–)3(–4) ± leathery rather thin valves. Seeds large, each partly or almost completely covered by a bright red aril, or the aril apparendy absent and then the testa fleshy.
Filaments 10, completely united to form a staminal tube bearing the anthers on its more or less entire margin or united only in the lower half and then anthers inserted between a pair of deltate appendages; anthers glabrous; antherodes smaller than the anthers and not producing pollen.
Ovary small, with 2–3 (4) loculi, each with 2 collateral or superposed ovules; style elongate, much longer than the ovary, distally expanded to form a capitate coroniform or ovoid style-head, only part of which is stigmatic; stigmatic surface entire or deeply 2–3-lobed.
Flowers unisexual and apparently dioecious but with little external difference between those that are functionally male and those that are functionally female, borne in cymes or cymose panicles.
Seeds large, each partly or almost completely covered by a bright red aril, or the aril apparently absent and then the testa fleshy.
Disk always present (in our area), either completely fused to the base of the staminal tube or cup-shaped and free from it.
Calyx cupuliform with 5 minute teeth, or deeply lobed with 5 deltate or circular lobes.
Petals 5, free, imbricate, much longer than the calyx in bud, linear or linear-oblong.
Leaves imparipinnate, rarely 3-foliolate or 1-foliolate, alternate, leaflets entire.
Pistillode similar to the gynoecium but narrower, usually with vestigial ovules.
Fruit a loculicidal capsule with (2) 3 (4) ± leathery rather thin valves.
Trees, often of large size, or rarely shrublets.
