Large, straggling shrub or small, deciduous, often gregarious tree, usually with young branches unarmed or sparsely armed; branches, inflorescence and fruits covered with short, grey tomentum; leaves elliptic-ovate or orbicular, glabrous above, white or yellow tomentose beneath, base slightly oblique, subcordate, margin serrulate, apex rounded; prickles usually geminate, one straight, other recurved, glabrous; flowers in axillary, dense, shortly peduncled, compact cymes, usually pentamerous or sometimes tetramerous; calyx glabrous within; petals pale yellow, subspathulate, reflexed, very concave; disk thin, 5-angled; ovary 3 (rarely 2) locular; styles usually 3, divided to near the base; drupe globose, 3-celled, 3-seeded, dry, hard, covered with grey or white tomentum when young.