Plants herbaceous, perennial, erect or ± climbing, with rootstock and rhizomes; stems to 1.2 m, quadrangular, glabrous to strigose, with retrorsely aculeolate ribs or narrow wings. Leaves in whorls of 4(or 6), sometimes unequal; petiole 1-5 cm; blade drying papery to subleathery, reddish abaxially or brownish green, lanceolate, lanceolate-ovate, or oblong-ovate, 1.5-5 × 0.5-1.5 cm, length/breadth index 2.5-3.5, both surfaces glabrous, strigillose, or strigose and sparsely to densely scaberulous, base truncate to cordate, margin serrulate-aculeolate or ciliate, apex acute to acuminate; principal veins 3 or 5, palmate. Inflorescences thyrsoid, paniculate, with terminal and axillary, ± many-flowered cymes, axes strigillose to glabrous; aculeolate; bracts lanceolate, 1-5 mm; pedicels 1.5-4 mm. Ovary ca. 0.8 mm, subglabrous. Corolla purplish red or yellowish white, campanulate, glabrous to sparsely hirsutulous; fused part 0.8-1 mm; lobes ovate to lanceolate, 1-1.5 mm, strongly reflexed, caudate to shortly acuminate. Mericarp berry black at maturity, 4-5 mm in diam. Fl. Apr-Jun, fr. Jun-Sep.
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