Description: Shrubs or trees.
Leaves opposite, often 3-veined from base, petiolate.
Inflorescences axillary, flowers solitary or in 3–11-flowered cymes or raceme-like. Flowers 4- or 5-merous. Hypanthium not, or scarcely, exceeding the ovary summit. Sepals free, persistent in fruit. Petals free, white, pink or red. Stamens numerous, in 3–6 series. Ovary inferior, 1–4-locular; placentas usually axile, rarely parietal, with the ovules in 2 series; style slender, stigma capitate.
Fruit a dry or fleshy berry; seeds few to many with a hard testa, each contained in a compartment formed by false septa; embryo curved or coiled, cotyledons very small.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 11 species, southern China to New Caledonia. Australia: 8 species (endemic), Qld, N.S.W.
Text by Peter G. Wilson
Taxon concept:
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