Annual or perennial herb 0.1–0.8 m high, with several branched stems arising from a decumbent base rooting at the nodes; roots long; stems yellow-green, flushed reddish or purplish; branches unwinged or very narrowly winged just below the leaf but not continuous, glabrous or sparsely pilose, sparsely glandular.. Leaves aromatic, lanceolate to linear, 1.5–11 cm long, 0.3–1.6 cm wide, base attenuate and not or shortly decurrent, margin denticulate or serrulate to subentire, apex acute, sparsely puberulous to glabrous, glandular-punctate.. Glomerules mauve or purplish, sessile or on stalks of up to 15 mm long, bristly, resembling conifer cones, (narrowly) ovoid, (10–)13–25 mm long, 7–15 mm in diameter; receptacle cylindrical or narrowly ovoid; glomerule bracts green with purple apex or entirely purple, closely overlapping, the proximal larger than the others but not forming a cup, lanceolate to widely ovate, 5–9 mm long, to 5 mm wide, acuminate, the distal violin-shaped, 3.5–6 mm long, to 3.5 mm wide, margins scarious, apex truncate and cuspidate, all bracts glabrous; capitula sessile, with 3 bracts, the laterals folded, 3–5 mm long, scarious with a truncate or cuspidate and ciliate apex.. Florets white with pale mauve tips; outer florets (3–)4, stalked, tube filiform, 1.7–2.6 mm long, glandular, 3-lobed at the apex with the lobes 0.1–0.2 mm long, style 1.8–3.4 mm long, bifid; inner florets 2, the tube widening and abruptly constricted just below the lobes, 1.5–2.4 mm long, rapidly becoming corky, sparsely glandular, lobes 0.3–0.7 mm long, puberulous and glandular; anthers cream, 0.7–2.3 mm long with a brief ovate distal appendage; style white with pale mauve tip, 2.6–4.7 mm long, papillose, entire or very shortly bifid at the apex.. Achenes 0.6–1.6 mm long, ovoid and puberulous in the outer florets, flattened and glabrous in the inner florets, possibly sterile.
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