Annual, biennial or perennial herbs, glabrous or with simple and few-branched hairs. Leaves petiolate or sessile; margins entire, toothed, or pinnately lobed. Inflorescence a raceme. Sepals erect or ascending, equal or slightly dimorphic; petals clawed, usually white; stamens 6. Fruit linear or cylindric, more than 3 times as long as wide, dehiscent; style minute, capitate; valves convex, usually with 1 prominent midvein; seeds usually in 1 row, sometimes mucous.