作者

LIU, TANG-SHUI

型態特徵

Small herbs, shrubs or trees, usually aromatic; stems branched or not, nodes swollen. Leaves opposite or alternate, serrate, pinnately veined; petioles often connate by a horizontal ridge on stem or by a short sheath at base; stipules small, subulate, subtending petiole or inserted on margins of sheath. Flowers small, unisexual or bisexual, in terminal or pseudo-axillary spikes, heads or panicles; each flower subtended by bracts; perianth of bisexual flower absent; stamens 1 or 3, either connate below or united into a 3-toothed body adnate to ovary, filaments very short and thick, fleshy, anthers 2-celled, introrse or lateral; perianth of pistillate flower present; ovary inferior, 1-celled, styles very short, linear or absent, stigma sessile; ovule 1, orthotropous, pendulous from top of cavity. Fruit a drupe, small, fleshy, indehiscent, ovoid or globose; exocarp more or less succulent; endocarp hardened. Seed solitary, pendulous, testa membranaceous; embryo minute, with copious fleshy endosperm, far from hilum.

屬

Genera three, with about 25 species, mainly in tropical and subtropical (not African) regions. Two genera in Taiwan.

參考文獻

• LIU, TANG-SHUI, Flora of Taiwan, second edition 2: 632. 1996.  (Fl. Taiwan 2nd edit.)