Vet. Akad. Handl. Stockholm 40: 217 (1779); Gen. Gram: 76 (1986).- Type-species: Ehrharta capensis Thunb.
Description:
* Annuals or perennials. Leaves flat or rolled, often auricled, sometimes much reduced.
* Inflorescence a panicle, rarely a solitary spikelet.
* Spikelets with mostly subequal glumes, shorter than or as long as the spikelet. Sterile lemmas glabrous or hairy, 1 or both transversely ridged or winkled, awned or awnless, the upper sometimes with basal appendages or tufts of hairs, its hook-shaped base forming a hinge between 1st and 3rd lemmas; palea 2-nerved.
Genus with 35 species, mainly in Sout Africa and Indoneisa to new Zealand, one up to Ethiopia and South Sudan.