Description from Flora of China Shrubs or small trees; branches
often terminating as spines. Leaves opposite or subopposite,
sometimes crowded on short lateral shoots, simple, entire,
estipulate. Flowers solitary, terminal or 1-5 in axillary or
terminal clusters, actinomorphic, bisexual. Floral tube thick,
leathery, adnate to ovary and produced above it; sepals thick,
valvate, persistent. Petals showy, red [or white], strongly
crumpled. Stamens numerous, covering inner surface of floral
tube from rim to ovary. Ovary inferior, multiloculed; style
exserted; stigma capitate. Fruit berrylike, with leathery rind,
retaining a crown of sepals. Seeds many, with translucent, juicy
sarcotesta; cotyledons spirally rolled. Two species: one endemic
to the Indian Ocean island of Socotra; one of uncertain native
origin, probably from C and SW Asia, now widespread in
cultivation. (Authors: Qin Haining (覃海宁); Shirley Graham)