Large shrub or small, crooked tree, often armed; leaves exstipulate, opposite or subopposite sometimes clustered, oblong or obovate, narrower at both ends, obtuse, entire, shiny, glabrous on both surfaces; flowers shortly pedicelled, showy, large, scarlet red, axillary, solitary or clustered; calyx tube campanulate, adnate to the ovary below and produced above, coriaceous, red; sepals 5-7, ovate, triangular, thick, leathery, persistent on fruit; petals 5-7, deciduous, orange red or pale yellow, inserted between the calyx lobes, distinctly clawed, limbs wrinkled; stamens many, inserted round the mouth of calyx, deciduous, filaments incurved, anthers 2-celled, dorsifixed; ovary inferior, many celled, many ovuled; style long, bent; stigma capitate; berries large, subglobose, many celled, red-pink or yellowish-white, crowned by unaltered calyx segments, thick walled, subdehiscent; seeds numerous, angular, fleshy or juicy.