Pleiocarpa

Evergreen shrubs or trees; stems and leaves completely glabrous; white latex present in all parts; spines and tendrils absent. Leaves opposite or in whorls of 3-5, elliptic to obovate; petiole angled, often narrowly winged; stipules absent. Inflorescences cymose, axillary, rarely also terminal; pedicels short or absent. Calyx glabrous; lobes free to base, herbaceous, imbricate, not revolute, without scales on inner surface. Corolla hypocrateriform, externally glabrous, internally pubescent below stamens; tube often with 5 splits developing at level of stamens; lobes contorted, overlapping to the left, not ciliate. Stamens arising at or above middle of corolla tube; filaments short; anthers dorsifixed, introrse, longitudinally dehiscent. Ovary glabrous, composed of 2-5 separate carpels, with 1-4 ovules per carpel; clavuncle present; stigma reduced to a sessile area or rarely represented by a rudimentary apiculus. Fruit a compound berry of 2 variously shaped, fleshy to slightly fibrous mericarps with a rounded to hook-shaped apex. Seeds variously shaped, with smooth brown testa; embryo straight, spathulate, surrounded by a thick, rather starchy and hard endosperm, leaving a hole around radicle base; cotyledons elliptic, thin and leafy, radicle almost cylindric.