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Annual herb, erect, 15–30 (52) cm. tall, glabrous throughout, simple or branched from the base and/or upwards with long, widely divaricate branches; stem and branches slender and wiry, striate-sulcate.
Seeds compressed-oval, black, shiny with a prominent hilum, the testa reticulate centrally and punctate in the corners of the areolae, smoother and epunctate along the margins.
Leaves linear-filiform, 8–45 × 0.3–1 mm., rarely oblanceolate and up to 34 × 8 mm., subacute, the midrib prominent on the inferior surface.
Bracts and bracteoles similar, deltoid-ovate, acute, c. 1.25–1.5 mm. long, shortly mucronate with the thick, yellowish, excurrent midrib.
Inflorescences silvery-stramineous, of dense short spikes up to 4 cm. long and 6–9 mm. broad, terminal on the stem and branches.
Ovary 4–6-ovulate; style c. 2 mm. long; stigma solitary, linear or very shortly bilobed.
Filaments with the free apex shorter than the basal cup; no intermediate teeth present.
Capsule subglobose, not exserted beyond the perianth.
