Linociera Swartz.

Trees or shrubs, usually evergreen. Leaves opposite, simple, petiolate; leaf blade entire. Inflorescences axillary or rarely terminal panicles, sometimes cymes, umbels, heads, racemes, or fascicles. Flowers bisexual. Calyx small, 4-toothed or 4-lobed. Corolla white or yellow, 4-parted; lobes almost free to base or united into a very short tube or joined in pairs at base, valvate in bud. Stamens 2, inserted at base of corolla lobes; anthers elliptic or long elliptic, subextrorse. Ovules 2 in each locule, pendulous. Style short; stigma entire or 2-cleft. Fruit a drupe; endocarp bony. Seeds usually 1; endosperm fleshy or absent; radicle upward.

About 80 species: tropical and subtropical Africa, America, Asia, and Australia; 7 species in China.

Chionanthus and Linociera were treated as independent genera in FRPS. Although Chionanthus species are evergreen and pantropical and those of Linociera are deciduous and grow in temperature E Asia and North America, the two genera are indistinguishable morphologically and are best treated as one. Chionanthus caudatus (Collett & Hemsley) Bahadur & Gaur has been recorded near the border in Myanmar but not, so far, from China. It would key out at C. ramiflorus in the following key, but would be distinguished by its oblong-elliptic leaf blades with caudate-acuminate apices and petioles 7-10 mm.