Evergreen herbs; leaves pseudo-petiolate, armed with spines on the pseudo-petiole; lamina cuneate or broadly lanceolate in outline but bifid in the last third of the distal part, plicate; leaf lamina with spines along the main leaf vein and the leaf margins; inflorescence axis short, emerging at the base of the pseudo-petioles, racemose, composed of about 50 flowers, laterally flattened, flowers subtended by clasping triangular pubescent bracts; flowers sessile; tepals creamish to yellow, lanceolate; stamens with short filaments, anthers basifixed sagittate, with the connective overtopping the anthers, stigma a triangular pyramid of which the flanks are covered with stigmatic papillae, very long rostrum, ovary short, spindle shaped, ovule number ca. 20; fruit an ovoidal berry, on short thick pedicel, ca. 6 mm long, ca. 18 mm long and 10 mm wide (when dry), containing from less than ten to over a dozen seeds; seeds ovoidal with an extremely short funicle and a very slightly protruded micropyle, 4.5–5.3 mm long and 3.5–4.3 mm wide; seed testa covered with irregular conical papillae, composed of smaller elongated papillae with irregular striae created by the wrinkled cuticle.

Type (holotype):— Curculigo seychellensis Bojer ex Baker (1877: 368); for the nomenclatural type of this name see below.

Etymology:—The genus Friedmannia is dedicated to Francis Friedmann, a retired botanist of the Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle in Paris/ France who devoted most of his professional life to the flora of the Seychelles. In Hypoxidaceae, he recognised the uniqueness of the genus Hypoxidia, which he raised into the rank of a genus of its own.