Plants terrestrial, epilithic or epiphytic. Rhizome erect to suberect, to 40 mm long, to 5 mm in diameter, set with roots, crowded persistent stipe bases and scales, scales thinly crustaceous, atrocastaneus, matt, clathrate, sessile, lanceolate to subulate, cordate to cordate-imbricate, margins regularly set with short filiform outgrowths, pluricellular, uniseriate, apex terminates in an oblong thin-walled cell, to 19 mm long, to 4.5 mm wide. Fronds crowded, caespitose, suberect to arching, to 570 mm long; stipe firm, proximally castaneus to black, green higher up, firm, sulcate, centrally raised, to 200 mm long, to 2.5 mm in diameter, initially sparsely scaled, glabrous later, scales thinly crustaceous, atrocastaneus to black, clathrate, sessile, subulate, cordate to cordate-imbricate, basally with several filiform outgrowths terminating in an enlarged broadly elliptic thin-walled cell, entire towards the apex, apex terminates in an enlarged broadly elliptic thin-walled cell, to 7 mm long, to 1 mm wide; lamina anadromous, to 3-pinnate, narrow elliptic, to 400 mm long, to 120 mm wide, with up to 23 pinna pairs; rachis firm, green, sulcate, centrally ridged, sparsely scaled, scales similar to, but smaller than, those on the stipe; pinnae petiolate, petiole to 3 mm long, opposite to alternate, basally widely spaced, more closely spaced towards the apex and often slightly overlapping, firmly herbaceous to coriaceus, lanceolate to ovate, to 80 mm long, to 40 mm wide, with up to 10 pinnule pairs; pinna-rachis sulcate, centrally ridged, ridge not confluent with that of the rachis, sparsely scaled, scales similar to, but smaller than, those on the rachis, to 1.5 mm long; pinnules opposite to alternate, flabellate, rhomboid, elliptic or linear, the larger divided into oblong lobes, lobes entire, to 7 mm long, to 2 mm wide, glabrous adaxially, abaxially sparsely set with scales similar to those on the pinna-rachis. Venation anadromous, evident, raised adaxially, pinnately branched, ending in the lobes near the margin. Sori linear, 1 per lobe, medial to supramedial, to 2 mm long; indusium membranous, linear, entire, extending from the vein almost to the margin, to 2 mm long, to 0.6 mm wide; sporangium long-stalked, uniseriate, 3-seriate below capsule, capsule broadly elliptic in lateral view, with (17-)19(-19) indurated annulus cells, epistomium (2-)2(-3)-celled, hypostomium 4-celled. Spores 64 per sporangium, brown, elliptic, monolete, perispore folded to form narrow reticulate ridges, erose, areolae between the ridges with a fine reticulate meshwork, (38-)42.6(-48) x (24-)26.9(-30) (m. Figure 49C & D.