Description :

• Perennial climbers to lianas, provided with tendrils
• Leaves lobed or simple, petiolate, margin mostly dentate; petiole and blade with or without glands; stipules minute to large
• Inflorescences sessile or peduncled, 1-many-flowered with or without a simple tendril; bracts and bracteoles small to large, forming a conspicuous involucre or not
• Flowers 5-merous; hypanthium saucer-shaped to cylindrical
• Sepals and petals free, often brightly coloured; petals mostly resembling sepals, sometimes 0
• Corona extra-staminal, variously shaped, composed of a usually complicated outer corona consisting of threads, and flat or plicate inner coronas, and a nectary ring or annulus
• Androgynophore mostly distinct
• Stamens 5(-8), free, in older flowers mostly reflexed
• Gynophore 0, or sometimes up to 7 mm long
• Ovary globose to fusiform; styles 3(4), free or connate at base; stigmas capitate
• Fruit mostly indehiscent, baccate, often with coriaceous exocarp, globose or ellipsoid, or rarely fusiform, many-seeded
• x = 6 (10, 11) (polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

• *Passiflora L.
  • Linnaeus: 1355 (1753)
  • De Wilde: 124 (1976)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global : Species ± 370, mostly Americas and ± 20 in SE China and Australasia
• Southern Africa : Several species have been introduced as ornamentals or for the edible fruits, e.g. * Passiflora edulis Sims (Granadilla)