Ann E. Rushing

Plants minute, with upright branches arising from a pale, fleshy, subterranean, aphyllous stem. Leaves crowded above, broadly concave, ovate, elliptic to obovate, cell walls of lamina often thickened at the corners. Seta short to moderately elongate. Capsule globose, immersed or exserted; gymnostomous; operculum present or absent.

Genera 6 (1 in the flora): largely distributed in the Southern Hemisphere.

The major defining feature of the family is the fleshy, underground stem from which short gametophore branches are produced in abundance. Sporophyte features differentiate the six, mostly monotypic genera, Chamaebryum in South Africa, Costesia in South America, Gigaspermum in Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, Lorentziella in southern U.S.A. and South America, Neosharpiella in Mexico and South America, and Oedipodiella in South Africa.

Lower Taxon

• Lorentziella J. K. A. Müller