Rhizome both creeping and erect, the creeping rhizome slender 0.3-0.4 cm diam. giving rise to small fronds 2-3 cm apart, and an erect or suberect often massive caudex, 2-5(-7) cm diam., crowned with a rosette usually of 5-8 robust fronds and clothed with bases of old stipes and densely clothed with robust broadly acuminate, entire, shiny dark brown to dark mahogany coloured scales 1-3 by 0.25-0.7 cm, which vary from concolorous to distinctly bicolorous with a dark reddish brown, almost black central region and a reddish brown margin. Fertile and sterile fronds similar in the range of dimensions (except that fertile fronds usually have longer stipes so that much of the fertile lamina with its narrow linear pinnae is emergent), erect, 30-130 by 4-15 cm. Stipes 14-70 cm, strongly grooved on upper face, semi-terete below, variable in colour from pale stramineous to (more frequently) dark reddish purple, scales at the bases of stipes persistent, similar to those of the rhizome, those 10 cm above base similar in shape and colour (or sometimes lighter in colour) but somewhat smaller, up to 1.5 by 0.1-0.3 cm, also irregularly distributed lanuginose scales (smaller, matted and appressed scales of various shapes), stipes densely scaly in young stages but many scales deciduous. Lamina narrowly elliptic to narrowly ovate, pinnate, 60 cm or more in length, usually longer than the stipe but sometimes shorter, dark green above, mid green below, 6-55 pairs of pinnae. Rhachis and costae sometimes stramineous but more frequently brown, reddish brown or dark brown, densely scaly, especially on the costal undersurface, with conspicuous persistent acuminate entire scales similar to those of the stipe but smaller and usually paler; some scales (up to 1 by 0.2 cm) with darker centres mixed with irregularly distributed lanuginose fringed paler small linear scales on lower surface of costae, costae deeply grooved on upper surface. Sterile pinnae oblong-narrowly elliptic acuminate, frequently set at 45° to the axis of the rhachis and sometimes tending to be falcate, 4-7 by 0.4-0.8 cm, distinctly subpetiolate and distant on the rhachis but more crowded and sometimes semi-adnate towards the apex, brittle and coarsely coriaceous, margins entire and usually very strongly and persistently revolute; veins once or twice furcate, sunken in fine conspicuous grooves on upper surface, prominent on undersurface but obscured by dense scales; veins terminating in ovoid to clavate glands; basal pinnae gradually becoming shorter to approximately half the length of those of the mid-region and more distant, terminal pinna usually but not always longer than the subterminal pairs. Fertile pinnae narrowly elliptic obtuse, 4-10 by 0.3-0.5 cm, at maturity less conspicuously to not revolute and enlarging almost to the width of the sterile revolute pinnae, although usually a little shorter and set more closely and at a more acute angle on the rhachis, increasingly falcate towards the frond apex; veins terminating in rounded glands visible on the adaxial surface; sporangia completely covering the abaxial face. Spores c. 70.5 by 52.9 µm (from 10 herbarium specimens), perine costate-alate to saccate, loosely reticulate, lacunae irregular polygons, muri thick ridges, surface of perine scabrous to granulose or microreticulate, exine smooth to scabrous.
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