I. Friis (2006) Ebenaceae Flora of Somalia 3: 6-11
Plants trees or shrubs, usually evergreen. Leaves alternate, subopposite to almost whorled. leathery, margins sometimes wavy, otherwise entire. Inflorescences usually simple or branched false racemes, occasionally flowers solitary. Maleflowers usually larger than the female flowers; calyces 4-5-lobed, shallowly cup- or saucer-shaped, not enlarging in fruit; corollas bell-shaped, 4- or 5-lobed, usually divided to below the middle; stamens 10-30, bascially 2 opposite and 2 alternating with each corolla lobed but this arrangement often modified; filaments usually shorter than the anthers; anthers slightly exserted or at least clearly visible from the outside, lancelate or narrowly obling, usually bristly, often dehiscent at first by large apical pores which later elongate into longitudinal slits; pistillodes usuall very reduced, with or without stylodes, or absent. Female flowers: ovaries globose, hairy or covered with peltate scales, usually with 4-6 cells and with 1-ovule each, occasionally with 2 or 3 ovules, if cells incompletely septate, with 2 ovules each; styles 2 or 3, free or united in the lower half, often as long as the ovary, usually glabrous, ending in a slightly 2-lobed stigmatic surface. Fruits small, 1(-3)-seeded berries, up to 10 mm in diameter; seeds subglobose, with 3 radiating lines from the top.
Euclea includes about 12 species. It is confined to Africa, Arabia, Socotra, and the Comoros Islands. All species grow in South Africa. Six extend into tropical Africa.