Description: Perennial herbs with an ovoid tunicated corm; stem or scape simple or branched.
Leaves several, basal and cauline with tubular or open sheathing base.
Inflorescence a cyme, raceme-like, or a solitary terminal flower, irregularly bracteate. Flowers bisexual. Tepals 6, in 1 whorl, similar, free, without nectaries. Stamens 6; filaments filiform; anthers dorsifixed, versatile, latrorse, dehiscing longitudinally. Ovules several–many per loculus.
Capsule loculicidal; seeds globose to ovoid, brown.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 13 species, Africa, Madagascar, India, South-East Asia & Australia. Australia: 1 species (native).