Rootstock a bulb or rhizome. Plants sometimes smelling strongly of onion. Flowers in umbels, subtended by a spathe. Perianth segments fused into a tube below, 6-lobed and sometimes with a corona at the mouth of the tube (Tulbaghia). Stamens 6. Ovary superior, 3-locular. Fruit a capsule. Seeds flattened, black, shiny.