Small trees, shrubs or perennial herbs with milky latex. Stems and branches succulent. Stipules 0 or modified as glands or spines. Leaves alternate, fleshy. Inflorescences axillary with sessile cyathia in dichotomously branching cymes, rarely solitary; bracts paired, persistent. Cyathium
with glands forming an entire rim, notched on the lower
side, surrounding 5-fringed lobes. Male flowers in 5 groups,
bracteolate. Female flower stalked; ovary 3-locular; styles 3 with
2-fid stigmas. Fruit a 3-lobed capsule, exserted
through the notch in the glandular rim, dehiscent. Seeds
with a cap-like pale yellow caruncle, rarely ecarunculate. Worldwide: Over 70 spp, occurring in eastern tropical Africa from Somalia in the north to the northern province of South Africa and west into Angola |
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