Description from Flora of China Plants usually woody, or herbs,
sometimes lacking chlorophyll. Leaves spiral, sometimes
decussate, margin often toothed. Inflorescence racemose;
bracteoles paired, basal. Flowers (4 or)5-merous. Calyx
imbricate. Corolla connate, imbricate. Stamens 10, sometimes
with spurs or awns, dehiscing by pores, pollen in tetrads,
rarely single. Ovary superior or inferior, placentation axile,
rarely parietal, often many ovules per locule. Style ± as long
as corolla, slender. Fruit a capsule or berry, rarely a drupe;
calyx persistent. The Monotropoideae are here included in the
Ericaceae; previously in FRPS (56: 157–216. 1990), they were
treated as the Pyrolaceae. Chiogenes, recorded from China in
FRPS (57(3): 69–71. 1991), is here included in Gaultheria. Over
the last half century, the Empetraceae have usually been
separated from, but closely associated with, the Ericaceae. In
their ecology, leaf morphology and insertion, rusts, embryology,
stamen anatomy, etc., they largely agree with tha