Sebastiania (sebastiania)

-bas-ti-a'ni-ä), n. [NL. (Sprengel, 1821), named after Antonio Sebastiani, stiani, who wrote (1813-19) on the plants of Rome.] Rome.] A genus of apetalous plants of the order Euphorbia ceæ, tribe Crotoneæ, and subtribe Hippomaneæ. It is characterized by moncæcio us flowers without a disk and with minute floral bracts, a three to five-parted calyx, the realest a tee eæ. with spreading or undivided and with ovules. There are about 40 species, natives chiefly of Brazil, with two in the tropics of the Old World, and another, S. lucid a, known as crabwood or poisonwood, in the West Indies and Florida. They are usually slender shrubs, with small and narrow alternate leaves and slender racemes, which are terminal or also lateral, and consist of many minute staminate flowers, usually with a single larger solitary pistillate flower below.