General description:- Perennial herbs or shrubs.

Leaves:- Alternate, exstipulate.

Flowers:- Usually solitary, hermaphrodite, actinomorphic, hypogynous. Sepals 5, free. Petals 5-10(-13), free. Stamens numerous. Carpels 2-8, free, borne on a fleshy disc.

Fruit:- A group of 2-8 follicles, each with several seeds.

PAEONIA

General description:- Robust perennials, with erect, tuberous stock and fleshy roots.

Leaves:- Large, simply biternate or further divided.

Flowers:- 6-14 cm in diam; petals white, pink or red in the European species. Stamens numerous. Follicles spreading horizontally;

Fruit:- Seeds in 2 rows.