Climbing herb, up to 5 m with long slender branches, thinly pubescent; leaves alternate, exstipulate, 3-5 foliolate, biternate, leaflets deltoid or ovate with margins irregularly crenate-serrate, apex acuminate-acute; flowers irregular, polygamous, white in terminal or axillary, panicles or racemes, lowermost pair of pedicels modified into tendrils; male flowers with sepals 4-5, rather unequal, oblong; petals 4 in 2 pairs, place of fifth vacant, white, erect, oblong, tomentose outside; stamens 8, inserted around base of unilateral disk, filaments slender, equal, anthers small, shortly exerted; in bisexual flowers: outer whorls same as in males; ovary 3-lobed, contracted at apex into short, erect style; stigma 3-lobed; ovule solitary in each locule; capsule of 1-3 cocci, sharply 3 lobed, globose or pyriform, winged at angles, pubescent; seeds exalbuminous, black, large.