| Perennial (rarely annual) herbs, or undershrubs, terrestrial or aquatic, sometimes stoloniferous ( Gunnera). Leaves opposite, spiral, or verticillate, in the terrestrial species nearly always simple, in the aquatic ones always partly pinnately divided, pinnately nerved or (in Gunnera) palmately nerved. Stipules 0, but the leaves often flanked by small, subulate and caducous enations. Flowers mostly in spike-like inflorescences, sometimes in a compound panicle, mostly solitary or (sometimes) in clusters of up to a dozen flowers in the axil of a bract or reduced leaf, ♀ monoecious, dioecious or polygamous, perigynous, actinomorphous, mostly 4-merous, or 2-, or (not in Mal.) 3-merous. Sepals 4 or 2, rarely (not in Mal.) 3, in ♀ flowers sometimes much reduced... |
