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Dioecious or sometimes monoecious trees or shrubs, with a simple indumentum (or stellate, outside Flora Zambesiaca area) .Leaves alternate, petiolate, stipulate, simple, crenate or serrate, sometimes remotely so, sometimes glandular beneath, stipellate or exstipellate, penni- or palminerved.Inflorescences usually unisexual, terminal or axillary, solitary or fascicled, spicate or paniculate, usually lax.Male flowers small, in bracteate clusters.Female flowers usually solitary per bract.Male flowers: calyx closed in bud, ± globose, later valvately 2–5-partite; petals and disk absent; stamens 8, rarely fewer, filaments free or ± connate at the base, anthers oblong, dorsifixed, introrse, the thecae ± parallel, longitudinally dehiscent; pistillode columnar, 2–3-lobed, or absent.Female flowers: sepals (3)4(6), imbricate; petals and disk absent; ovary (1)2–3(4)-celled, with 1 ovule per cell; styles free or ± free, usually simple, linear.Fruits 2–4-lobed or subglobose, smooth or warty, septicidally dehiscent into bivalved cocci; endocarp crustaceous.Seeds subglobose, ecarunculate; testa crustaceous; albumen fleshy; cotyledons broad, flat.