Herbs perennial, 10--15 cm tall. Stems few to several from a creeping branched base, ascending, simple, glandular hairy. Basal leaves caespitose, pale green or dark green, linear or narrowly oblanceolate, 3--6 cm × 2--4(--10) mm, both surfaces sparsely hairy, ciliate at base, base attenuate into petiole, apex acute; cauline leaves usually 2--4, linear or narrowly oblanceolate. Flowers solitary, rarely 2 or 3, slightly nutant. Pedicel 8--20 mm, densely glandular villous; bracts lanceolate, herbaceous. Calyx globose, saccate, 1.8--2 × 1.2--1.6 cm, membranous, slightly contracted at mouth, with prominent dark violet veins, densely glandular villous, loose in fruit; calyx teeth broadly triangular, ca. 5 × 6 mm, margin membranous, glandular ciliate. Androgynophore 1.5--2 mm, woolly. Petals exserted 3--5 mm beyond calyx, blackish violet; claw obovate, ca. 10 × 5 mm, auriculate, ciliate at base; limbs broadly obovate, ca. 5 × 4--5 mm, shallowly bifid; lobes dentate with small round teeth; coronal scales truncate at apex, dentate with round teeth. Filaments ± hairy at base; anthers dark violet. Styles slightly exserted. Capsule subglobose, ca. 2 cm in diam., shorter than calyx, 5--10-toothed at apex. Seeds brown, triangular-reniform, flat, ca. 1.8 mm including wing. Fl. and fr. Jul--Sep.
Alpine meadows, gravelly grasslands, shifting screes; at elevations from 3,000-4,500 metres in western China and the Himalayas.
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