Robust plants, 65–200 cm. high.. Rhizome short, thick, vertical, moniliform, bearing fibrous remains of old leaf-bases; roots spongy, fusiform, extensive, without tubers.. Leaves rosulate, sheathing at the base, oblong-lanceolate, petiolate, glabrous, 25–80 cm. long, 3–8 cm. wide; margins not undulate.. Peduncle terete, glabrous, 5–7 mm. in diameter, with deciduous leaves all along.. Inflorescence a laxpanicle, much exserted above the leaves, up to 80 cm. long; flowers sometimes congested in the apical parts of the branches; floral bracts lanceolate, glabrous.. Pedicels articulated above the middle, up to 30 mm. long in fruit, 4–9-nate at the lower nodes.. Flowers ± pendulous, often congested; perianth greenish to whitish, urceolate; tepals (9–)12–20 mm. long, 2–3 mm. wide, with ligulate rims above the constriction to the cup, 3-veined, scabrid on the margins.. Stamens shorter than the perianth; filaments fusiform, with transverse papillate ridges, longer than the anthers.. Ovary stipitate; style nearly as long as the stamens.. Capsule obovoid, nearly rounded in cross-section, 10–12 mm. long.. Seeds disc-shaped, 3 mm. in diameter.. Fig. 2/1–2.
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