Shrubs or small trees, with white latex and with simple or forked spines. Branches repeatedly dichotomously branched. Stipules 0. Leaves opposite. Flowers in terminal corymbs or 1-5-flowered cymes. Calyx lobes imbricate, free to base. Corolla salver-shaped; tube cylindric; lobes contorted, overlapping either to left or right. Stamens inserted at middle or towards top of corolla tube; anthers subsessile, glabrous. Ovary with 2 carpels, with 1-4 or rarely many ovules per loculus. Fruit an ellipsoid or ovoid berry. Seeds discoid or flattened-ellipsoid, velutinous.