Roots carrotlike, up to 10 mm wide. Caudexes robust, often branched; scales persistent, linear-lanceolate, 3.5-5 mm. Stems caespitose, prostrate to ascending, pale purple, slender, 5-25 cm, simple or with short branches. Leaves alternate, lowermost leaves scalelike; blade ovate or rhombic, 3-9 × 2-6 mm, abaxially densely white hirsute, adaxially sparsely white hirsute or glabrous, base obtuse or subtruncate, margin revolute, crenulately 3-5-lobed or-parted, rarely entire, apex truncate; petiole 2-7 mm. Flowers large, solitary and terminal on main stems and branches, subtended by a whorl-like aggregation of 4 or 5 leaves; pedicels 3-5 mm. Calyx densely hirsute with long pale brown stiff hairs; tube cylindrical, 7-12 mm; lobes triangular or narrowly triangular, 4-6 × 2-3.5 mm, both sides hirsute, margins ciliate. Corolla dark blue or purple-blue, 2.5-4.8 cm, outside glabrous, inside densely villous at throat; lobes narrowly obovate or oblong, 1/3-1/2 as long as tube, apex with a tuft of hairs outside. Ovary 5-locular, nearly as long as calyx tube; style extended up to corolla throat; stigma 5-fid. Fl. Aug-Sep.
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