Tree, c. 10 m by 10-20 cm ø; bark smooth, grey-brown. Branchlets initially fulvous-hairy, soon glabrescent, slender, greyish black, with sparse minute lenticels; terminal bud ovoid-ellipsoid, 3-4 by 2 mm, scales ovate or elliptic, acute, 2-3 by 1 mm. Stipules linear-acute, 3-4 by 0.7-1 mm. Leaves 7-15 by 2-5 cm (index 2.5-3.1), widest about the middle; base attenuate, top gradually to abruptly acuminate with a tip of 1-2 cm; surfaces both glabrous and then concolorous, rather glossy, to underneath sparsely set with adpressed stellate scales (magnification 40!) and then pale dull brownish; midrib and nerves strongly prominent beneath, sunken above, nerves 7-11 pairs at an angle of 60-80°, ascending, subparallel, arcuating and anastomosing near the margin; petiole 1-2 cm, dark-coloured towards the base, adaxially sulcate. Female rachis c. 5½ cm, 1½ mm ø; bracts broadly ovate-acute, 1 by 1 mm; ♀ flowers solitary, perianth deeply incised, lobes 6, ovate-acute, densely hairy on both sides, staminodes 12, rather well developed and ± exceeding the perianth, styles 3, cylindrical, recurved, 1-1½ mm long. Cupule sessile, compressed-globose, 2-3 cm through; wall subglabrous, very densely spiny, less densely in the adaxial sector, the spines in bundles, 8-10 mm, unbranched, slender, ± straight, subglabrous. Fruit solitary, ellipsoid-com-planate, 1½-2 by 1-1½ cm, wall woody, 1-2 mm thick, completely adnate to the cupule, rugose, glabrous; cotyledons flat-convex.
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