A genus of three or four species of deciduous trees and shrubs ranging from the central Himalaya to China, closely allied to Prunus subgenus Padus (the bird cherries). Leaves alternate, serrate, on short petioles, with large stipules. Flowers very small, in dense racemes on leafy peduncles. Calyx of ten segments, inserted on the rim of the calyx-tube (hypanthium). Petals absent, though some calyx-lobes may have petaloid tips. Carpels one or two, usually only one developing into a ripe fruit, which is a small black drupe with a single stone.
The generic name commemorates Lt-Col. Edward Madden (d. 1856), for whose plant introductions see Journ. R.H.S., Vol. 97, pp. 203-6 (1972).