Name honors Giovani Francesco Maratti (1723-1777), Benedictine abbot and later professor of botany in Rome.
Plants medium-sized to large, terrestrial. Rhizomes erect, short, large. Stipes swollen at bases, flanked by 2 large, fleshy stipules, cross sections at bases revealing several concentric circles of fine vascular bundles surrounding 1-2 small central bundles. Blades 1- to 4-pinnate, deltate or linear-ovate. Pinnules sessile or short-stalked, ovate-lanceolate tooblong, apexes serrate to dentate, acuminate. Synangia medial to submarginal.
A pantropical genus of seventy or more specit;s. Represented in Hawai 'i by a single, now uncommon, endemic species.
