Herbs, perennial, (12-)30-50 cm tall, glabrous or papillose-pubescent along petiolules and veins; stems and petioles of radical leaves attenuate to filiform underground base. Storage roots fascicled, narrowly spindle-shaped, 1.5-5 cm × 1.5-3 mm, fleshy. Stems few, erect to ascending, often reddish, branched, naked in lower 1/3-2/3, with 2 or 3 leaves. Radical leaves few; petiole to 20 cm, very slender. Cauline leaves: petiole 0.5-4 cm, or upper leaves sessile, membranous shortly vaginate at base; blade glaucous abaxially, green adaxially, triangular, 4-7 × 3-6 cm (or uppermost very small), unequally bi-or triternate; primary petiolules long; ultimate lobes entire, broadly obovate to broadly lanceolate, obtuse to acute. Racemes spikelike, simple or rarely branched, terminal and axillary from uppermost leaf, 3-10 cm, at fruiting extended to 15 cm, 10-20-flowered; bracts narrowly rhombic-ovate to lanceolate, 4-8 mm, entire. Pedicel 5-8 mm, recurved in fruit. Sepals minute (ca. 0.1 mm). Corolla blue, with purplish spots at apex (keels, margins) and tip of spur, "pale indigo, whitish mauve, lilac blue or blue"; outer petals navicular-acute, with narrow to rather broad entire crest slightly overtopping apex; upper petal 9-12 mm, spur upwardly directed, tapering to a rather thin apex, (4-)5-7 mm; nectary ca. 3/4 as long as spur, thin; lower petal 7-9 mm, conspicuously saccate at base, central part contracted, distal 1/3 slightly reflexed; inner petals 6-7 mm, inside apically purple-black, elliptic. Ovules 9-12; style sigmoidally curved; stigma very peculiar, transverse with 4 long erect-spreading papillae and geminate lateral papillae. Capsule narrowly elliptic, 7-9 × ca. 2.5 mm; style 2-2.5 mm. Fl. and fr. Jul-Aug.
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