Citation: L., Sp. Pl. 587 (1753).

Derivation: Latin diminutive of Molucca from where 1 species is supposed to have come.

Synonymy: Not Applicable

Common name: None

Description:
Annual herbs with terete branches, glabrous; leaves petiolate, opposite, coarsely dentate to lobed.

Inflorescence a thyrse with sessile cymose part-inflorescences usually forming dense clusters around the nodes and with elongated internodes between them, with leaf-like bracts subtending each part-inflorescence which is covered with spreading spinose bracts of the second order; sepals equally fused into a slightly zygomorphic broad funnel-shaped tube, with mucronate lobes, glabrous; corolla 2-lipped, with posterior lip oblong, hooded and without lobes, with anterior lip spathulate, with 2 narrow lateral lobes and a broad spathulate central one; stamens 4 fertile, inserted in the throat of the corolla tube; anthers with 2 cells fertile and diverging to about 90ø from the attachment of the filaments, enclosed in a hood of the posterior lip; ovary deeply 4-lobed, with each locule with 1 basal ovule, with a gynobasic style and a terminal 2-fid stigma.

Fruit usually with 4 mericarps often dispersed still retained in the persistent calyx, each obpyramidal with 3 keels and a truncate apex, with the attachment scar oval with a one-sided depression on the inside.

Distribution:  4 species occurring from the Mediterranean to north-western India; 1 species naturalised in Australia.

Biology: No text

Author: Not yet available