5230.000 Bergia L.

Prostrate or erect, annual or perennial herbs or undershrubs, often pubescent, sometimes glandular-pubescent. Leaves opposite, usually sessile or subsessile, obovate, lanceolate, elliptic or linear, entire or serrate; stipules usually denticulate or puberulous at the margin. Flowers axillary, sessile or pedicelled, solitary or fascicled or in small cymes, sometimes crowded and verticillate. Sepals 4–5 (6), free, lanceolate, elliptic or oblong, usually keeled and with hyaline margins, imbricate. Petals 4–5 (6), free, as long as or slightly shorter than the sepals, oblong, or linear-oblong. Ovary 5 (rarely 4)-locular; carpels almost free. Fruit a septicidal capsule with the valves separating from the central column from above and so releasing the numerous seeds. Seeds subcylindric with rounded ends or 3-angled, often shiny, brown or almost black; embryo straight or curved.

Worldwide: 29 species, cosmopolitan.

Zimbabwe: 6 taxa.