Description from
Flora of China
Trees or shrubs, evergreen or very rarely deciduous. Branches unarmed. Stipules small, free or sometimes connate, soon caducous. Leaves simple, alternate, conduplicate when young, usually with 2 to rarely several nectaries on petiole, at base on leaf blade abaxial surface, or along leaf blade margin; leaf blade margin entire or serrate. Inflorescences axillary, usually racemose, rarely in a fascicle, very rarely paniculate, usually with more than 10 flowers; bracts small, soon caducous, basal ones usually sterile and with a tripartite or tridentate apex; bracteoles often absent. Flowers usually bisexual, sometimes male with ovary ± reduced. Hypanthium cup-shaped to campanulate. Sepals 5. Petals 5, white, longer than sepals. Stamens 10–50, in 2 whorls, inner ones shorter. Ovary superior, 1-loculed, glabrous or sometimes pubescent; ovules 2, collateral. Style terminal; stigma disc-shaped. Fruit a drupe; mesocarp succulent, not splitting when ripe; endocarp bony or woody, surface smooth or rugose.
About 80 species: Asia, Europe, New Guinea, North and South America; 13 species (six endemic) in China.
(Authors: Lu Lingdi (Lu Ling-ti); Bruce Bartholomew)