Description:

• Shrubs up to 500 mm high, sometimes thorny, erect to procumbent; internodes whitish
• Leaves of a pair slightly connate, short and fat with convex sides, mucronate, greyish green to dark green; epidermis with elevations above subhypodermal tannin idioblasts, papillate
• Flowers relatively small, ± 10-20 mm in diameter, in richly to poorly branched dichasia, with additional lateral inflorescences, sometimes umbellate and crowded, rarely solitary; spines in inflorescences irregularly distributed, derived from pedicels having lost the fruit; with 2 leafy bracts, with or without bracteoles
• Sepals 5, nearly equal
• Petals in 1 series or 0, white to violet
• Stamens and staminodes present, collected in a cone, often papillate
• Nectary a crenulate ring
• Ovary raised on top; placentas parietal; stigmas 5, subulate, erect
• Fruit capsule close to the Ruschia type; 5-locular; bottom bell-shaped, top convex, valve rims high; valves opening completely, valve wings broad and rectangular; closing bodies white; covering membranes complete with distal closing rodlets and low rims
• Seeds smooth, almost round, amber-coloured
• x = 9 (1 report)

• Flowering throughout the year, peaking in winter

• Distinguishing characters:
  • Flat-growing to erect shrubs
  • Leaves greyish green or reddish or bluish, textured
  • Fruit with valves folding back entirely when expanded

Nomenclature:

• Eberlanzia Schwantes
  • Schwantes: 189 (1926)
  • Friedrich: 42 (1970)
  • Herre: 144 (1971)
  • Hartmann & Stüber: 1 (1993)
  • Hartmann: 29 (1996)
  • Smith et al.: 350 (1998)
  • Hartmann: 44 (1998)

Distribution & Notes:

• Southern Africa: Species 8, mainly on sandy flats with limestone pebbles characteristic of the southern Namib Desert, Namibia, also in western Namaqualand, Northern Cape