Cystopus Blume (1858), not Léveillé (1847); Evrardia Gagnepain (1932), not Adanson (1763); Evrardiana Averyanov, nom. illeg. superfl.; Evrardianthe Rauschert; Pristiglottis Cretzoiu & J. J. Smith.

Herbs, terrestrial, autotrophic or rarely holomycotrophic. Rhizome creeping, cylindric, several noded, fleshy; roots narrowly filiform to fibrous, arising singly from rhizome nodes or rarely absent. Stem erect or ascending, with 1 to a few loose tubular sheaths at base, and a few scattered or subrosulate leaves, or leafless (when holomycotrophic), glabrous. Leaves green or purple, occasionally with 1-3 white stripes, suborbicular, ovate-lanceolate, or elliptic, oblique, with a short to long petiole-like base dilating into tubular amplexicaul sheath. Inflorescence erect, terminal, racemose, glabrous or pubescent; peduncle with a few scattered sheathing bracts; rachis laxly to subdensely few to many flowered; floral bracts membranous, glabrous or pubescent. Flowers resupinate or erect and not resupinate; ovary twisted or not, slender, glabrous or pubescent. Sepals glabrous or pubescent; dorsal sepal free or connate for half its length with lateral sepals; lateral sepals similar to dorsal sepal, completely enclosing base of lip. Petals usually appressed to dorsal sepal, linear-ligulate to ovate, membranous; lip 3-partite, spurless; hypochile subglobose, aseptate and saccate or with a central septum and bisaccate, containing a pair of fleshy calli; mesochile usually elongate, tubular, external margin with an entire or fimbriate-pectinate flange, rarely with 2 flanges on either side, or rarely not flanged at all. Column dilated, twisted or not, ventrally with 2 intramarginal, lamellate appendages (wings); anther erect, ovoid, 2-locular; pollinia 2, obovoid-obpyriform or clavate, usually attenuate into slender stalks that attach to a solitary small viscidium; rostellum deltoid, remnant shortly to deeply bifid; stigma lobes separate to confluent, placed directly beneath rostellum. Capsule ellipsoid.

The circumscription of Odontochilus has been contentious, with the structural similarity of its flowers to those of Anoectochilus often resulting in its inclusion in the latter. It is defined here (following Pridgeon et al., Gen. Orchid. 3: 126-129. 2003) by the combination of a saccate but spurless lip that is enclosed at its base by the lateral sepals and the placement of the confluent or occasionally separate stigma lobes directly beneath the rostellum.

About 40 species: N India and the Himalayas, through SE Asia, as far north as Japan, east to the SW Pacific islands; 11 species (two endemic) in China.

(Authors: Chen Xinqi (陈心启 Chen Sing-chi); Stephan W. Gale, Phillip J. Cribb, Paul Ormerod)