Small deciduous tree or shrub 2–10 m tall; bark grey or brown, smooth or with close and shallow longitudinal fissures; young shoots pale ferruginous pubescent. Leaves: petiole 1.4–5 mm long, glabrescent; blade often red when young, drying pale green or brown with pale yellow nerves above and beneath, obovate, 5.5–12 x 3–6.5 cm, cuneate to truncate at the base, shortly cuspidate at the apex, somewhat leathery, lower surface densely setulose on the midrib, sparsely so elsewhere, very young leaves usually velvety on both surfaces and mature leaves sometimes entirely glabrous; lateral nerves in 6–9 pairs, prominent beneath, tertiary nerves ± ladder-like, with the venation closely reticulate, prominent above and more so beneath. Male flowers (1–)3(–7), in lax cymes borne towards the base of the current year's shoot in the axils of fallen reduced leaves and the first-formed foliage leaves; peduncle c. 6 mm long; pedicels 1–3 mm long, fulvous-tomentellous; calyx c. 2.5 mm long, strigulose-tomentellous outside, glabrous inside, 4-lobed ± to the middle, the lobes rounded; corolla subrotate, c. 7 mm long, strigulose on midpetaline lines but otherwise glabrous; corolla-tube 1.5 mm long; corolla-lobes 4, ovate-ligulate; stamens 24–28, 4–5 mm long; filaments 1–1.5 mm long, glabrous, inserted singly or in pairs on the corolla-tube; anthers linear-lanceolate, apiculate, glabrous or strigulose; rudimentary ovary 1 x 1 mm, sparsely setulose. Female flowers solitary, borne as in male; pedicel c. 4 mm. long; calyx c. 6 mm long, more deeply lobed than in male, the lobes markedly imbricate; corolla greenish, 7–8.5 mm long; staminodes 4, inserted on the corolla-tube and alternating with the lobes, c. 2 mm long, glabrous save for a single apical seta; ovary subglobose, c. 2.5 x 2.5 mm, 8–10-celled; styles 4(–5), as long as the ovary, ascending, expanding towards apex, fleshy and stigmatic on inner surface. Fruit dark yellow, subglobose, c. 2 cm in diam., glabrous, with calyx slightly enlarging, c. 1.2 cm long, the lobes c. 8 x 6 mm, reflexed, with conspicuous, flabellately arranged longitudinal veins. Seeds 8–10 or sometimes fewer by abortion, often only 1 developing, dark brown, segmentoid, c. 1.2 x 0.6 x 0.5 cm, with wrinkled surface.
