Shrub or small tree to 5 m tall; twigs viscid-tomentose with nearly sessile, multangulate hairs, often suffused with purple, the midpoints long and gland-tipped, armed with short, sericeous, acicular spines to 7 mm long. Leaves to 25 cm long, broadly ovate, angular-or sinuate-lobed, apically obtuse, basally hastate, sometimes dimidiate, both sides tomentose with hairs like those of the twigs, the underside drying reticulate veined, a denser-tomentum outlining the veins, the major veins often armed; petioles to 12 cm long, sparingly armed. In-florescence lateral, fascicled or subumbellate on a very short to 10 mm long, stout, tomentose peduncle; pedicels 4-6 mm long, congested, becoming stout and 7-25 mm long in fruit. Flowers with the calyx lobed nearly to the base, the lobes elliptical or ovate with the midvein strongly marked, sometimes quite unequal, villous inside and out, 7-10 mm long in flower, becoming broader and reflexed, sometimes sub-foliaceous in fruit; corolla white, deeply lobed, 2.5-3 cm across, tomentose outside, glabrous within; anthers sessile, 12-15 mm long, stout below and abruptly narrowed to a point, bent outward at the tip so that dehiscence is extrorse; style glabrous, slightly exceeding the anthers. Fruit a persistently tomentose yellow berry, variable in size but sometimes attaining 2 cm across; seeds yellow, 3 mm long, compressed-lenticular.
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