Moraea maximiliani (Schltr.) Goldblatt & J.C.Manning

Plants 90-150 mm high. Corm ± globose, 9-12 mm diam., slightly asymmetric with a lateral downward ridge; tunics dark brown, inner layers unbroken, outer of flat sections held together by cross fibres, sometimes becoming ± fibrous with age. Stem erect or inclined, with long basal aerial internode, leaves and branches crowded at first aerial node, with fibrous cataphylls sometimes accumulating as a collar around base. Leaves 2 or 3, inserted well above ground and clustered at first aerial node, lowermost much longer than others, narrowly channelled, linear to filiform, straight to strongly falcate or trailing distally. Rhipidial spathes on short to nearly sessile branches, with acute, brown-tipped apices, inner 20-35 mm long, outer 1/2 to ± as long, sheathing below, usually free and diverging distally. Flowers fugaceous, pale yellow to beige, tepals veined with dark brown, bases of all tepal limbs with deeper yellow nectar guides edged distally with red-brown; tepals subequal, oblanceolate-pandurate, limbs spreading to laxly reflexed, outer 15-24 x 6-10 mm, claws ascending, ± 6 mm long, inner narrower and slightly shorter than outer. Filaments united in smooth, slender column 6-8 mm long; anthers ± erect, contiguous, 2.0-2.5 mm long, yellow; pollen yellow. Ovary narrowly top-shaped, 3-6 mm long, usually exserted; style branches short, ± 1 mm long, narrow, forked apically with tips diverging and extending between anthers, without crests. Capsules club-shaped to oblong, 6-10 mm long. Seeds small, angular-prismatic.