Description:

• Annual or perennial herbs, usually hirsute or scabrid, sometimes densely bristly or spiny
• Leaves alternate, rarely opposite, usually petiolate, toothed, or pinnately lobed, rarely entire; stipules 0
• Flowers bisexual, regular, in bifid or dichotomous, scorpioid cymes, with flowers usually subsessile along one side of branches, or in simple spikes, or racemes, sometimes solitary
• Calyx 5- or 10-12-lobed, sometimes appendiculate between lobes
• Corolla funnel-shaped to campanulate or rotate, with 5 or 10-12 imbricate, rarely contorted lobes
• Stamens as many as corolla lobes and alternating with them, usually arising on corolla tube near base, exserted or included; filaments sometimes dilated or appendiculate at base; anthers 2-thecous
• Disc hypogynous, small or absent
• Ovary superior, falsely 2-locular, due to 2 intruding parietal placentas, placentation then appearing axile; ovules 4-many; style 2-fid
• Fruit a loculicidal, 2-valved capsule
• Seeds 2-many; embryo straight, in oily endosperm

Nomenclature:

• Hydrophyllaceae
  • Candolle: 287 (1845)
  • Bentham: 825 (1876)
  • Baker: 1 (1906)
  • Brand: 1 (1913)
  • Phillips: 624 (1951)
  • Friedrich-Holzhammer: 1 (1967)
  • Tutin: 83 (1972)
  • Verdcourt: 57 (1990)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global: Genera 22, species 275, subcosmopolitan (excluding Australia), especially in dry W and N America
• Southern Africa: Genera 2, species 3

References:

• BAKER, J.G. 1906. Hydrophyllaceae. Flora of tropical Africa 4,2
• BENTHAM, G. 1876. Hydrophyllaceae. In G. Bentham & J.D. Hooker, Genera plantarum 2. Reeve, London
• BRAND, A. 1913. Hydrophyllaceae. Das Pflanzenreich, Heft 59 (4. 251)
• CANDOLLE, A.P. DE. 1845. Hydrophyllaceae. Prodromus 9. Fortin, Paris
• FRIEDRICH-HOLZHAMMER, M. 1967. Hydrophyllaceae. Prodromus einer Flora von Südwestafrika 118
• PHILLIPS, E.P. 1951. Hydrophyllaceae. The genera of South African flowering plants. Memoirs of the Botanical Survey of South Africa No. 25
• TUTIN, T.G. 1972. Hydrophyllaceae. Flora europaea 3
• VERDCOURT, B. 1990. Hydrophyllaceae. Flora zambesiaca 7,4

Resources:

• Key to Hydrophyllaceae genera

• Hydrophyllaceae genera: