Connaraceae is a pan-tropical plant family of 19[4] genera and more than 180 species[5] of largely evergreen trees, woody shrubs and climbers.

[6]: 107  Their habitat is generally lowland tropical rain forest and savanna.

Their leaves are pinnate, trifoliate or rarely entire, alternate, without stipules and with a pulvinus at the base of the petiole.

[7] Fossil leaflet impression described as Rourea miocaudata from India shows close resemblance to leaflets of the extant Rourea caudata, it has been recorded from the lower part of the Siwalik sediments (Dafla Formation, middle–upper Miocene) of Pinjoli area in West Kameng district, Arunachal Pradesh.

[8] Permineralized wood of a stem with the distinctive anatomy of a liana has been described with fossil fruits from a locality in the lower Miocene (19 mya) Cucaracha Formation, where the formation is exposed by the Culebra Cut of the Panama Canal.