Vines, herbaceous, or ± climbing herbs; stems to perhaps 1.5 m, quadrangular to 4-ridged, glabrous, ribs aculeolate. Leaves in whorls of 4; petiole 3-12 cm, aculeolate, often pulvinate and strongly bent at base of blade; blade drying papery, grayish brown, linear to narrowly lanceolate, 3-9 × 0.5-1 cm, both surfaces glabrous, smooth or sparsely scaberulous, base obtuse to rounded, margin flat and smooth to denticulate, apex acute to acuminate; principal veins 3, palmate. Inflorescences thyrsoid, paniculate, with terminal and axillary, few-to many-flowered cymes; axes glabrous, aculeolate; bracts linear-lanceolate, 0.5-3 mm; pedicels 3-4 mm. Ovary ca. 0.5 mm, scaberulous. Corolla green, rotate, glabrous; fused basal part ca. 0.5 mm; lobes lanceolate-triangular, ca. 1 mm, cuspidate. Fruit apparently black, 5-6 mm. Fl. Jun-Jul, fr. Sep.
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