Botanical Survey of India | Flora of India

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Shrubs or trees. Stipules caducous. Leaves simple, opposite or subopposite. coriaceous or subcoriaceous, entire or crenulate. Inflorescence axillary or extra axillary peduncled cymes. Flowers bisexual, 4-5-merous. Calyx lobes imbricate. Petals imbricate, spreading. Stamens inserted on or slightly under the outer margin of the disc; filaments subulate; anthers subglobose or deltoid, versatile, introrse. Gynoecium short, conical or more or less flask shaped, base slightly united with the disc or partly immersed in it. Ovary 2-loculed; style very short; stigmas obscure or slightly 2-lobed; ovules 2 in each locule, erect, attached at the base. Disc orbicular or lobed, flat, fleshy. Fruits a drupe, indehiscent, 1-2 loculed; exocarps thin or fleshy; endocarps leathery or mostly stony. Seeds 1-2, exarillate.

Mostly in Africa but widely distributed in the tropics of both the hemispheres; ca 80 species, 4 in India.

Literature. DING HOU (1962) in Fl. Males. 1. 6(2): 284.



KEY TO THE SPECIES


1a. Flowers 4-merous; disc thin. wavy 4. Cassine viburnifolia
b. Flowers 5-merous; disk thick. fleshy 2
2a. Bushy shrubs 2. Cassine balae
b. Trees 3
3a. Petals orbicular 1. Cassine albens
b. Petals spathulate 3. Cassine paniculata


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