Shrub or tree up to 8 m high (in our area) with a slightly rounded or flattened and somewhat spreading crown, or a slender spindly tree with irregular virgate branches. Bark yellowish- or greyish-brown to purp­lish-black, rough, often corky and flaking off or smooth, papery and peeling off in strips; young branchlets yellowish- or greyish-brown to purplish-black, sometimes as though whitewashed over a purplish back­ground, smooth or rough and flaking minutely or exfoliating to reveal a yellow inner layer, glabrous to densely pubescent. Stipules not spinescent, in pairs, linear, up to 5 mm long, soon deciduous. Prickles just below the nodes, up to 9 mm long, typically in threes, the central one hooked down­wards and the two laterals -± curved upwards, or else solitary, the laterals being absent. Leaves: petiole 0,2-2 cm long, sparingly to densely pubescent, rarely subglabrous, ad-axial gland usually present, sometimes two, variable in position, 0,5-0,75 mm in diam.; rhachis 0,7-6,9 cm long, sparingly to densely pubescent, lower surface with or without recurved prickles, with a gland at the junction of the top 1-5 pinnae pairs, between each pair or absent from some; pinnae (2)3-8(12) pairs; rhachillae 0,5-2,5 cm long, sparingly to densely pubescent; leaflets 7-25 pairs per pinna, 1-7 X 0,5-1,75 mm, linear to linear-or elliptic-oblong, apex obtuse to subacute, margins with or without cilia, sparingly appressed-pubescent above and beneath or entirely glabrous, lateral nerves invisible beneath or sometimes ± prominent. Inflore­scences spicate, solitary or fascicled. Flowers yellowish-white, sessile; spikes 1,5-10 cm long, axis glabrous to densely pubescent; peduncle 0,1-2 cm long. Calyx sometimes tinged with pink, glabrous to somewhat pubescent, tube 0,9-2,6 mm long, lobes 0,2-0,8 mm long. Corolla glabrous or sub-glabrous, tube 2-3,2 mm long, lobes up to 0,9 mm long. Stamen-filaments free, up to 7 mm long; anthers 0,2-0,25 mm across, with a deciduous apical gland. Ovary glabrous, very shortly stipitate. Pods yellowish- or greyish-brown to brown, 1,8-9,5 X 1,2-3,4 cm, oblong, straight or almost so, longitudinally dehiscent, venose, apex rounded to acuminate or distinctly rostrate, sparingly to densely appressed-pubescent or puberulous. Seeds olive-brown to brown, 8-12 mm in diam., ±subcircular-lenticular, compressed; central areole 2,5-6 x 2,5-5 mm, impressed, horse­shoe shaped.