Trees or shrubs. Leaves alternate, petiolate, usually black when dry, veins pinnate, margin entire. Flowers bisexual, small, in terminal or axillary panicles or cymose panicles. Calyx cupular, small, 5-toothed. Petals 5, free or slightly united at base, valvate, usually glabrous. Stamens 5, alternate petals and inserted at petal base; filaments dilated above; anthers sagittate, 2-lobed, dorsifixed. Ovary obliquely gibbous; style eccentric, slightly curved; stigma small, oblique. Drupe ovoid or ellipsoid, oblique; exocarp fragile, crustaceous.

One variable species (see H. Sleumer, Blumea 17: 189. 1969): tropical and subtropical Africa and tropical Asia, also extending into S China.