Description: Annual herbs, erect and branched, usually bristly.
Basal leaves lyrate-pinnatisect, petiolate.
Inflorescence corymbose, without bracts. Petals c. 10 mm long, shortly clawed, yellow.
Siliqua cylindrical, ± constricted between seeds, valves 3–5-veined; beak usually flattened, mostly 1-seeded; spreading on thick pedicel; seeds globose, 1 row per loculus.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 10 species, Mediterranean & Europe. Australia: 2 species (naturalized), all States except N.T.
Text by L. Retter & G. J. Harden
Taxon concept:
| | Key to the species | |
| 1 | Upper leaves sessile, simple, toothed; siliqua usually with more than 8 dark red-brown seeds; beak cylindrical or conical, hardly compressed, shorter than valves | Sinapis arvensis |
| All leaves petiolate, pinnately lobed; siliqua with less than 8 pale brown seeds; beak strongly compressed, sabre-like, at least as long as the valves | Sinapis alba |
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