M. Thulin (2006) Pentanisia in Flora of Somalia 3: 66-68
Plants perennial herbs, subshrubs, or shrublets. Leaves sessile or shortly petiolate; stipules united with the petioles at the base, fimbriate. Inflorescences usually few- to many-flowered terminal and capitate clusters. Flowers heterostylous; calyces usually with 5 lobes, 1-4 enlarged and leaflike, the remainder small or obsolute; corollas with narrowly cylindrical tubes, hairy at the throad, lobes usually 5, valvate in bud; ovaries 2-5-celled, each cell with 1 ovule attached near the top; styles filiform; stigmas divided into 2-5 filiform lobes. Fruits dry, globose or ovoid, slightly lobed, indehiscent or breaking up into mericarpsl; seeds flattened.
Pentanisa includes about 16 species. It is native to tropical Africa and Madagascar.