A woody liane to over 30 m long, of the bushy savanna in Sierra Leone and from Dahomey to W Cameroons and Fernando Po, and extending to Zaïre. Though well-recorded from Sierra Leone and cultivated there, it is apparently not indigenous (7): it is not recorded from Liberia, Ghana and Togo. Its presence in Sierra Leone may be due to returning slaves for it is known to the Krio by its Yoruba (Nigerian) name.The liane is cultivated in Sierra Leone on newly cleared land principally for the nuts, but the leaves and young shoots are edible and are eaten, often with rice (4, 6, 8). Cultivation trials have been carried out in Nigeria (9). The leaves are considered a headache cure in S Nigeria (5, 6), and have magical use to wash children to cause their mothers to conceive, the Igbo name meaning babies call babies (11). In Gabon consumption of the seeds by husbands of wives already pregnant is believed to mitigate the risk of miscarriage (13).Nigerian material has been screened for alkaloids, a trace of which is recorded in the bark (1).The fruit is a capsule 6–10 cm long by 3–11 cm wide containing sub-globular seeds 2–2.5 cm long with a thin brown shell resembling the temperate walnut, hence the English name. The seed kernel is edible. Eaten raw they have a bitter flavour not unlike the kola nut and are considered to be tonic (3, 4, 9, 12, 13) and aphrodisiac (14). More usually the kernels are roasted and eaten in the general diet, or added to cakes (14). The kernels are oil-bearing yielding 48–60% of a light golden coloured oil with a taste resembling linseed oil. Composition is linolenic acid 64%, palmitic and stearic acids 15%, oleic acid 11 % and linoleic acid 10% (4). This is conophor oil, or in the paint and varnish trade awusa or n’gart. It is edible and could be used in food preparations. It is unsuitable for soap-manufacture, and being quick drying it is certainly usable in the paint industry provided there is a certain supply and the kernels are free from excessive free fatty acids. Fresh oil has an iodine value of 190 (4) which is excellent for a drying oil, but the seeds do not store well and deterioration caused by enzymatic action needs to be prevented at the time of collection by heat-treatment (3). The oil has medicinal use in Nigeria in massages (2).The cake left after expression of the oil contains 45% protein. It has local uses for food and is obviously a good source of protein. It can safely be fed to stock (3). The plant, presumably the kernel, is a good source of vitamins (10).