Tall trees, rarely shrubs or (pseudo-) lianas. Leaves large, alternate, imparipinnate,
rarely 1 -
3-foliolate; stipulate or ex-stipulate; leaflets opposite, slightly oblique at base,
entire to dentate or serrate along margins, acuminate at apex; the lowest leaflets often stipuliform. Inflorescence axillary or terminal, sometimes pseudoterminal, branched
panicle, thyrsoid (sometimes reduced to racemes or spikes, especially the female ones).
Flowers bracteate, 3-merous, unisexual, or bisexual. Calyx cupular or urceolate; lobes
deltoid, valvate, persistent, more or less funnel-shaped or flat with undulate margins in
fruit. Petals free, oblong or obovate with a small inflexed apiculum, valvate or imbricate,
fleshy and thick except the base and margin, creamy white. Stamens 6, rarely 3; filaments
free or connate at base, often adnate to disk; anthers oblong-lanceolate, dorsifixed,
sterile in female flowers. Disk intrastaminal, 6-lobed; strongly developed in male
flowers. Ovary in female flowers ovoid to ellipsoid, 3-locular; ovules 2 in each locule;
style clindrical; stigma capitate, faintly 3-lobed. Pistil in male flowers reduced to a
Pistillode or absent, sometimes united with the disk to an ''ovariodisc'' Drupes ovoid
or ellipsoid, often 3-gonous, usually blue black when ripe, rarely ivory white or red;
pericarp fleshy (rarely fibrous); pyrene stony, 3-locular, 1 or 2 sterile; seed one in each
locule; testa brown; cotyledons palmatifid to 3-foliolate, oily.
SE. Asia (from S. Deccan to S. China and Hainan), Sri Lanka, the Mascarenes,
Madagascar, Mauritius, W. and E. Africa, Malesia, N.E. Australia, Micronesia (Palau),
Melanesia as far east as Samoa; ca 100 species, 6 species in India.
Literature.
LEENHOUTS, P.W.(1956). Burseraceae-Canarium In: STEENIS, Fl. Males. I, 5: 249 - 296;
(1959. Revision of the Burseraceae of the Malaysian area in a wider sense Xa Canarium. Blumea 9: 275 - 471.
