Scapose or leafy-stemmed herbs, with simple or branched rootstocks, never with bulbs or corms. Flowers solitary, racemose, panicled or umbelled, regular and perfect. Leaves broad, parallel-veined and sometimes with cross-veinlets, alternate, verticillate or basal, or in Asparagus and its allies reduced to scales bearing filiform or flattened branchlets in their axils. Perianth inferior, 4-6-parted with separate segments, or oblong, cylindric or urn-shaped and 6-lobed or 6-toothed. Stamens 6, rarely 4, hypogynous or borne on the perianth; anthers introrsely, extrorsely or laterally dehiscent. Ovary 2-3-celled, superior; ovules anatropous or amphitropous; style slender or short; stigma mostly 3-lobed. Fruit a fleshy berry, rarely a capsule. Seeds few or numerous. Embryo small.