Synonyms: Cassine APNI*
Description: Shrubs or trees, glabrous.
Leaves opposite, sub-opposite or alternate, entire, crenate, dentate, or spinose.
Inflorescences axillary, cymose. Flowers bisexual or unisexual (dioecious, polygamous, or monoecious), 3–5-merous; disc fleshy, annular, entire, 4–5-angled, or lobed, intrastaminal or stamens on disk; anthers longitudinally dehiscent, introrse or extrorse; ovary 2–4-locular; ovules erect, 2 per locule.
Fruit a spheroid or ellipsoid drupe, fleshy or coriaceous; seeds 1–2, sometimes 3, ellipsoid or ovoid, flattened or triangular.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 40 species. West Indies, Africa, Madagascar, India, Macronesia. Australia: 2 species (endemic) Qld., NSW, N.T., W.A.
Text by Louisa Murray (April 2012)
Taxon concept: Kubitzki, K. ed. 2004. Flowering Plants. Dicotyledons: Celastrales, Vol vi, p45. Berlin: Springer.
Taxa not yet included in identification key
Elaeodendron australe,
Elaeodendron curtipendulum
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