Annual, erect ± branching herb up to 25 cm tall; stems at first with white or grey tomentum, glabrescent, purple. Leaves oblanceolate, 3–7 cm long, 1–2 cm wide, attenuate to a short petioloid base, margins minutely acutely serrulate, apex obtuse and apiculate, green, glabrous and gland-dotted above, pale green to white tomentose beneath. Capitula terminal and in the upper leaf axils, subsessile; involucre long-ovoid, deep purple with white tomentum, 13–20 mm long; phyllaries numerous (± 95–100), often dark red, linear-lanceolate or lanceolate, acuminate-pungent, the outer recurving, with minute marginal teeth and long-pungent apices, the inner erect, broader, entire, the longest ± 12 mm long; receptacle deeply alveolate, alveoli with long laciniate membranous margins. Ray florets 11–14; corolla very dark reddish purple or maroon, 8–12.5 mm long, rays broadly oblong, obtuse, minutely 3-toothed, 7–11.5 mm long, 2.5–4 mm wide; disc florets ± 10–20; corolla very dark reddish purple or maroon, glabrous, glandular, 6–7 mm long, lobes narrowly oblong, acute, 3–3.7 mm long. Achenes of disc florets 5.5–6 mm long, with a dense basal tuft of long coarse ascending white hairs and finer ascending hairs between the ribs; pappus 3.5–4 mm long. Fig. 5.
