Trees or shrubs, often with milky juice. Leaves alternate, coriaceous, entire; stipules usually wanting. Flowers regular, hermaphrodite or occasionally polygamous, axillary, solitary or page 435clustered. Calyx inferior, 4–8-lobed or -partite; lobes imbricate. Corolla gamopetalous, hypogynous, tube short, lobes as many or 2–4 times as many as the divisions of the calyx. Stamens inserted on the tube of the corolla and opposite to the lobes, either as many or twice as many as the lobes, sometimes alternating with staminodia. Ovary superior, 2–8-celled; style simple, straight; stigma punctiform, simple or lobed; ovules solitary in each cell, attached to the inner angle. Fruit a 1- to many-celled berry, frequently 1-celled and 1-seeded by abortion. Seeds often with the testa crustaceous and shining; albumen present or wanting; embryo straight, radicle inferior.

A small order, widely distributed in the tropics of both hemispheres, but almost unknown in temperate regions. Genera 25; species not far from 350, many of them imperfectly known. The order includes several species useful to man, the most important being the Malayan Isonandra gutta, which produces gutta-percha. The star-apple (GhrysovhyLlum Cainita) and the African butter-tree (Bassia Parkii) are edible species, and there are several others not so well known. The New Zealand genus is widely spread in tropical countries.