Erect, scandent or straggling shrub or small armed tree; stem robust, profusely armed; whitish-grey, young branches, zig-zag, reddish-brown, ending in leaf or flower bearing thorns; leaves alternate, exstipulate, obovate-oblanceolate, glabrous, coriaceous, crenate, apex obtuse, tapering towards base into long petiole; flowers small, white, axillary in dichotomously branched, rigid cymes shorter than leaves; peduncles solitary or fascicled, sometimes on the spines; pedicels slender, jointed below the middle; bracts small, lanceolate, acute; calyx 4-5 lobed, ciliate; petals 5, white, spreading, elliptic-oblong; stamens 5, inserted beneath the margin of the 10 lobed, fleshy, flat or rounded disc; ovary sunken in the disc, glabrous, orbicular, 2-3 celled, ovules 2 in each cell, style short, deeply 2-3 cleft, stigma 2-3 lobed or obscure; capsule globose-ovoid, 2-valved, 2-seeded, purple; seeds with aril at the base, partially or completely covering, rugose.