Herbs, perennial, slender, with tender rootstock. Stems procumbent or ascending, up to 30 cm, 4-angled, ± retrorsely aculeolate to somewhat hispidulous or smooth. Leaves in whorls of up to 5 or 6, sessile or narrowed to very short petiole; blade drying greenish brown and stiffly papery to subleathery, oblanceolate or narrowly elliptic-oblanceolate, 3.5-12(-15) × 1.5-3.5 mm, glabrous to ± hispidulous, sparsely to densely retrorsely aculeolate along margins and sometimes also on abaxial side of midrib, margins thinly revolute, apex acute and cuspidate; vein 1. Inflorescences with terminal and axillary cymes, 1-3-flowered with lanceolate bracts; peduncles up to 10 mm, glabrous and smooth; pedicels 2-7 mm, straight and elongating in fruit. Ovary obovoid, 0.5-0.8 mm, densely covered by undeveloped uncinate trichomes. Corolla pinkish or ± purplish, rotate, 1.1-1.5 mm in diam., glabrous; lobes 4, triangular, obtuse. Fruit with obovoid mericarps, ca. 2.5 mm, densely covered with spreading yellowish brown uncinate trichomes 0.4-0.8 mm. Fl. and fr. Jul-Sep.
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