27. Endospermum
Benth., nom. cons.
Trees, evergreen, usually dioecious, rarely flowers bisexual, unarmed, with watery or
coloured sap, sometimes myrmecophilous; indumentum usually of simple or sometimes partly
or completely of stellate hairs. Leaves alternate, petioled, peltate or non-peltate, usually palmately
3-nerved or rarely pinnately nerved; glands often present at the base of the leaf-blade and at the
forks of lateral nerves beneath and also often along the margins above; petioles usually
constricted at one or both the ends, leaving large conspicuous scars on branches; stipules
small, caducous. Inflorescences thyrsoid, usually branched; bracts and bracteoles concave.
Flowers unisexual or occasionally bisexual; calyx campanulate, 3 - 6-lobed or dentate; petals
absent. Male flowers: clustered; stamens (5 -) 6 - 10 (- 12), spirally arranged on an androphore;
filaments fused at base, free above; anthers peltate, (3 -) or 4-loculed, dehiscing by longitudinal
slit; pistillode absent. Female flowers: solitary; ovary (1 -) 2 - 3 (- 7)-loculed, with one ovule in
each locule; styles united into a disc with lobed sessile stigma; staminodes absent. Bisexual
flowers: clustered or solitary; calyx lobed; stamens 5 or ca 10, either at the base of the ovary or
spirally arranged on a short androgynophore; otherwise androecium and gynoecium as in male and female flowers. Fruits drupaceous, indehiscent, 2 - 3 (- 7)-loculed; exocarp thin to rather
thick and fleshy; endocarp thin, woody and fibrous. Seeds 2 or 3, ecarunculate; testa hard,
reticulately ribbed; endosperm whitish to orange, soft; embryo very small, flat; cotyledons 2,
elliptic or ovate; radicle triangular, acute.
Tropical and subtropical regions of NE. India, Andaman Islands, Myanmar, S. & SE. China, Thailand, Vietnam to Malesia, tropical Australia (Queensland) and up to Fiji Islands, ca 13 species; 3 in India.
Literature. SCHAEFFER, J. (1971). Revision of the genus Endospermum Bth. (Euphorbiaceae). Blumea 19: 171 - 192.
Tropical and subtropical regions of NE. India, Andaman Islands, Myanmar, S. & SE. China, Thailand, Vietnam to Malesia, tropical Australia (Queensland) and up to Fiji Islands, ca 13 species; 3 in India.
Literature. SCHAEFFER, J. (1971). Revision of the genus Endospermum Bth. (Euphorbiaceae). Blumea 19: 171 - 192.
KEY TO THE SPECIES
| 1a. Petiole glands 0 - 2; male inflorescences simple or almost so | 2. Endospermum diadenum |
| b. Petiole glands 2; male inflorescences compound, paniculate racemes | 2 |
| 2a. Petiolar glands globose, 2 - 3 mm in diam | 1. Endospermum chinense |
| b. Petiolar glands cylindrical or spiniform, 3 - 4 mm long | 3. Endospermum peltatum |
