Hermannia gariepina Eckl. & Zeyh.

Shrublet 22-75 cm tall, much branched, branches ascending or divaricate, densely and finely stellate-tomentose with short, greyish white hairs. Stipules 0.75-2 mm long, thick in texture and densely stellate-tomentose with short greyish white hairs, sometimes caducous. Leaves shortly petiolate; blade rather thick in texture and densely stellate-tomentose with short, grey hairs, variable in shape and size, elliptic-cuneate to obovate-or oblong-cuneate, broadest just above middle or at the apex, about 7 to 20 mm long, margin entire or crenate at the apex, base cruneate or subrounded, apex broadly acuminate or truncate and often shallowly 3-lobed; petiole often folded trough-shaped, 1-5 mm long, rather thick in texture and densely stellate-tomentose with short hairs. Inflorescence of 1-flowered cymes, solitary in axils of leaves, upper subtending leaves sometimes much reduced in size giving the appearance of racemes; peduncles 2.5-6 mm long, densely stellate-tomentose with short hairs; pedicels 3-5 mm long, distinguishable from the peduncle by the coarser stellate pubescence, hairs over 0.5 mm long; bracts minute or wanting. Calyx lobed almost to base, stellate-pubescent with hairs rather long (0.5-1 mm), tube 1.5-3 mm long, lobes 4.5-7 mm long. Petals pink, “purplish” or “violet”, 6.5-9 mm long, 2.5-6 mm broad; blade narrowly oblong to suborbicular, narrowing slightly into a claw in lower third, margins sometimes minutely ciliate, glabrous within, claw with slightly inrolled margins. Stamens with hyaline, obovate filaments which either narrow gradually or abruptly to apex and base and are glabrous or setose on shoulders; anthers 3.5-5 mm long, ciliate with sparse, short hairs, overlapping filament for 1.5 mm. Ovary about 2.5 mm long, 2 mm diam. with short papillose hairs on surfaces and setose or stellate along sutures and at apex; stipe 1.5 mm long; styles 5 mm long, slender, erect, exserted from the closed mature flower for about 2 mm. Capsule about 5 mm long, usually hidden in the persistent calyx and petals, obscurely 5-angled, surface papillose, sutures setose and stellate with a blunt lobe or short horn at apex, up to 2 mm long; stipe 1.5 mm long. Seeds brown, reniform, corrugated (and sometimes scaly?).