Wallichia Candolle (1823), not Roxburgh (1820), nor Reinwardt (1823).

Trees or shrubs, sometimes [?always] deciduous. Stipule linear, caducous; leaf blade mostly ± cordate, rarely obscurely palmately lobed, or oblong and entire, stellate hairy, abaxially mostly densely so, sometimes nearly glabrous, margin ± dentate. Inflorescence racemose, axillary or terminal, often 1-2-flowered, less often many-flowered. Epicalyx lobes 3-5, dentate or divided, rarely entire, falling at anthesis. Sepals 4 or 5, valvate, linear, apex acute, abaxially stellate hairy, adaxially villous. Petals 4 or 5, yellow or white, base tapering into flat villous claw, claw sharply recurved into S-bend with limb radially spreading. Stamens many, connate into monadelphous tube; filaments partly free; anthers linear-oblong, 2-celled, cells parallel; staminodes absent. Ovary sessile, 4-10-celled, tomentose; ovules many in each locule; style linear; stigma 4-10-lobed. Capsule woody or nearly woody, ovoid or narrowly ovoid, dehiscence loculicidal, valves 4-10, adaxial margin densely woolly. Seeds winged, wing membranous, as long as seeds; endosperm thin, cotyledons plicate.

Eriolaena is poorly represented in herbaria, and more gatherings, particularly of correlated flowering and fruiting material, are needed to clarify the taxa.

About 17 species: tropical and subtropical Asia; six species (one endemic) in China.