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Perennial herbs or shrublets, often branched from a woody rootstock. Leaves opposite or ternate, sessile, lanceolate, usually hairy; stipular sheaths +/- cup-shaped, with linear setae or fimbriae on either side, median often (much) longer than others. Flowers not heterostylous, paired, on short, persistent pedicels, in head- or spike-like inflorescences, elongating in fruit. Calyx 5-lobed, persistent; 1-3 lobes elongated and foliaceous, others minute. Corolla 5-lobed, white to light red, usually glabrous; lobes linear-lanceolate, much shorter than tube; tube narrowly cylindric, sometimes bearded in throat. Stamens (4)5, arising in throat of corolla, exserted; filaments slender; anthers oblong, dorsifixed. Ovary 2-locular, with a single erect ovule in each locule, attached near base; style filiform, bilobed, exserted; stigmas smooth, filiform. Fruit usually splitting into 2 mericarps, crowned with persistent calyx. x