Description:

• Trees or shrubs, rarely undershrubs or dwarf perennials from a woody rootstock
• Leaves opposite or rarely alternate, simple, entire, gland-dotted; stipules 0 or very small
• Flowers bisexual, regular, in cymes, heads, umbels, or corymbs, rarely solitary; bracts and bracteoles often present
• Calyx 3-5-lobed or sometimes entire; tube (hypanthium) ± adnate to ovary, and sometimes extending beyond it
• Petals 4 or 5 (6 or more), sometimes connate and all deciduous together, imbricate
• Disc lining calyx tube or flat
• Stamens many, in 1-many series, inflexed in bud, free or connate at base; filaments often thread-like; anthers small, 2-thecous, usually opening by lengthwise slits
• Ovary inferior, sometimes half-superior, 2-many-locular, usually with many axile, anatropous to campylotropous ovules in each locule, rarely 1 or few; style simple; stigma capitate, entire, or sometimes 3- or 4-parted
• Fruit a capsule or berry, wholly or partly enclosed in persistent calyx tube
• Seeds 1-many; testa often woody and glandular

Nomenclature:

• Myrtaceae
  • Sonder: 520 (1862)
  • Friedrich-Holzhammer: 1 (1966)
  • Proctor: 512 (1972)
  • George: 1 (1988)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global: Genera 100-120, species 3 900, mainly tropical and subtropical Australia and South America
• Southern Africa: Genera 9 (6 naturalised), species ± 34 (± 13 naturalised)

References:

• FRIEDRICH-HOLZHAMMER, M. 1966. Myrtaceae. Prodromus einer Flora von Südwestafrika 97
• GEORGE, A.S. 1988. Myrtaceae. Flora of Australia 19
• PROCTOR, G.R. 1972. Myrtaceae. In C.D. Adams, Flowering plants of Jamaica. University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica
• SONDER, O.W. 1862. Myrtaceae. Flora capensis 2

Resources:

• Key to Myrtaceae genera

• Myrtaceae genera: