Erect perennial coarse herbs or subshrubs to 1.5 m tall, rarely branching; stems greenish to brown with dense reddish puberulence, slightly ribbed. Leaves opposite; blades papyraceous, broadly elliptical, to 15 cm long and 9 cm wide, the base cuneate to narrowly acuminate, the margins distinctly bi-to tri-crenate, the apex acute to scarcely acuminate, the upper surface sparsely puberulous, the lower surface with glandular punctations, puberulous on veins, the venation mostly pinnate; petioles slender, to 5 cm long. Inflorescence a broad corymbose panicle with densely corymbose branches, the ultimate branches 2-4 mm long, densely puberulous. Heads ca. 5 mm high with 20-25 florets; involucral bracts ca. 28-30, subimbricate to imbricate, unequal, in 3-4 series, mostly 4-seriate, short-acute with scarious margins, the outer surface puberulous, the inner bracts with more scarious tips; corolla lavender, ca. 3 mm long, with many sharp-pointed hairs above and on lobes; style branches slightly thickened. Achenes scarcely constricted above, black when mature with black ribs, glabrate to sparsely bristly above and on the ribs; pappus of ca. 30 scabrous contiguous bristles.
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