[10] An alternative explanation for the name was given later by William Jackson Hooker in 1830 in Curtis's Botanical Magazine in the description of Ceropegia elegans: "From κηρός, wax, and πηγή, a fountain, in allusion to the delicate, waxy umbels of some species".

[11] However, four years later Hooker gave the etymology in the description in the same periodical of Ceropegia lushii as "remarkable for the peculiar shape of its flowers, frequently arranged in umbels, hence its name κηροπηγɩον, a candelabrum, or lamp-stand".

Among some species, such as Ceropegia woodii, the nodes swell, and the roots similarly expand to form tubers beneath the soil surface.

The flowers have a tubular corolla with five petals most often fused at the tips, forming an umbrella-like canopy, a cage, or appendage-like antennae.

[13][19] They are distributed throughout most of sub-Saharan Africa and Madagascar to the Arabian Peninsula, southeast Asia, the Canary Islands, the tropical Pacific, and Australia.