Lecythis Loefl.

Understorey, canopy, or emergent trees. Leaves scattered along branches, small to medium, less frequently large-sized (2.5-40 cm long), glabrous; secondary venation reticulate. Inflorescences ramiflorous, terminal, or axillary, racemose or spicate or once-branched paniculate arrangements of racemes or spikes, growth of rachises determinate. Flowers present with leaves but sometimes flowering as leaves flush (e.g., L. pisonis and L. poiteaui) depending on species, zygomorphic; sepals 6; petals 6, flat at apices; staminal lip present; androecial hood variable (flat with vestigial stamens [L. idatimon-type]; flat with staminodes over all of hood [L. persistens subsp. persistens-type]; flat with staminodes restrcted to proximal part of hood [L. pisonis-type]; flat, thickened, with vestigial stamens short [L. corrugata-type], with vestigial stamens swept inward but not forming coil [Bertholletia-type], with hood coiled inward but not forming second coil and vestigial anthers all the same [L. ollaria-type]); staminal lip present; stamens not reflexed, the anthers laterally dehiscent; ovary (3)4(6)-locular, ovules 2-30 in each locule, attached to lower part of septum, the style often obliquely oriented or geniculate, the stylar collar absent. Fruit dehiscent or less frequently indehiscent (e.g., L. lurida and L. prancei), remaining on tree or dropping to ground at maturity, generally globose, the pericarp thick. Seeds not winged, one to numerous, not flattened, not embedded in pulp (i.e., seeds easily removed from pulp), often fusiform or at least longer than broad, the testa glabrous; cotyledons absent; embryo macropodial.