Trees or shrubs with gummy, milky or resinous juice, often poisonous. Leaves usually compound. Fruit drupaceous, not infrequently having a strong turpentine odor and taste. The seeds of many species yield an abundance of bland oil.

A Manual of Organic Materia Medica and Pharmacognosy, 1917, was written by Lucius E. Sayre, B.S. Ph. M.