Shrubs or small trees, with cylindrical branches, obovate to obovate-oblong, coriaceous, entire leaves. Inflorescence umbellate, terminal, leaf-opposed or axillary, usually subsessile or sessile. Flowers 5-merous, 2-sexual, usually white, fragrant, ebracteate. Calyx 5-lobed, imbricate. Corolla 5-lobed, twice as long as the calyx, lobes acute, often reflexed. Stamens 5, epipetalous; filaments linear, hairy at base; anthers dithecous, dehiscing longi¬tudinally, locules transversely septate. Ovary fusiform or oblong, acute, glabrous, 1-loculed with many ovules on a central globose placenta; style terminal with a punctiform stigma. Fruit, oblong, cylindrical, curved above, acute, coriaceous, 1-seeded, at length splitting longitudinally; seed oblong, exalbuminous, viviparous.
A, probably, monotypic genus of maritime habitats in Asia and Australia. Some authors place it under a separate monotypic family, Aegicerataceae Blume, because of its transversely septate anther cells, viviparous seeds and maritime habitat.
