Description :

• Herbs with a basal, thaloid body closely appressed to substrate (resembling Marchantia ); upper branches, if developed, erect, slender, with leaves and flowers congested at nodes
• Leaves either repeatedly forked into linear segments or scale-like
• Flowers solitary or aggregated both on thallus and in axils of leaves on elongated stems, subtended by some rough, open bracts (reduced leaves); spathella obovoid, splitting irregularly, forming an open, funnel-shaped cup; pedicels up to 2 mm long
• Perianth of 2 subulate segments
• Stamens 2, with filaments fused to apex
• Ovary 1-locular, ovoid, sessile or shortly stipitate; styles 2
• Capsule globose to subglobose, with 8 wide ribs, opening by 2 unequal valves, larger one persistent
• Seeds flattened, ovate, smooth, black

Nomenclature:

• Sphaerothylax Bisch.
  • Bischoff: 426 (1844)
  • Hill: 483 (1912)
  • Obermeyer: 209 (1970)
  • Cook: 188 (1990)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global : Species 2 or perhaps more, Madagascar and tropical Africa
• Southern Africa : Species 1: Sphaerothylax algiformis Bisch., along the eastern escarpment from Mpumalanga to the Eastern Cape