Scrambling (rarely erect) shrub or climber. Branchlets slender, terete, with long internodes; lateral twigs transverse. Leaves decussate, usually pseudo-distichous, distinctly petioled, ovate to ovate-lanceolate, 5-14 by 2-6 cm, chartaceous, glabrous or more or less pubescent, sometimes even densely woolly pubescent beneath; base acute or sometimes rounded, truncate, or even subcordate; margin slightly revolute, usually entire to distantly dentate, sometimes lobed; apex acuminate, usually mucronate. Inflorescences axillary — often 2 in one leaf-axil and then the upper one stronger developed — widely and laxly branched, 2-5 cm long peduncled, mostly many-flowered, rarely 1-3-flowered, sometimes exceeding the leaves, usually thinly and shortly appressedly pubescent. Bracts persistent, narrowly triangular, up to 0.5 cm. Flowers 1.25-1.5(-2) cm long, more or less densely pubescent. Calyx-lobes linear, c. 2.5 mm. Corolla yellow or outside greenish, in the basal half more or less brownish to purple, tube inside densely velvety pubescent, membranous margins of the lobes entire. Style glabrous to sparsely pilose, the indusium excepted. Fruits (in dry state) obovoid to ellipsoid, 5-7 by 2.5-3 mm, with 2 (septal) grooves, furthermore slightly tuberculate, sub-glabrous, rarely scattered appressed-pubescent, black when ripe.
Mostly in rather open places, along forest edges, road-and river-sides, in shrubberies and secondary vegetation, rarely in forest, 0-2700 m. FL and fr. Jan.-Dec.
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