Hairy perennial herb with short stout caudex and numerous adventitious roots. Lvs all radical, few to many in the rosette; petiole usually 1-20 cm long, often purple, sometimes very short and ill-defined with woolly tuft at base. Lamina c. 2.5-30 × 7-8 cm, lanceolate, or obovate to broad-elliptic, hairy, especially beneath on the raised 5 or 7 main veins, entire or remotely dentate; base attenuate; apex obtuse. Scape c. 5-60 cm long, ± terete, densely hairy in upper part. Spike generally > 10 cm long at maturity, narrow-cylindric. Bracts usually slightly < sepals, ciliate, otherwise very similar to sepals. Sepals 2-3 mm long, broad-ovate, scarious except for central green or purple band, usually glabrous except for ciliate keel. Corolla tube = calyx; lobes 2.5-3 mm long, ovate, mostly soon curling involutely and forming a prominent, acute, erect, cone. Stamens glabrous, usually with small anthers and included (cleistogamous fls), sometimes with large, long-exserted anthers (chasmogamous fls). Style hairy, > corolla. Capsule 2.5-3.5 mm long, ovoid or ellipsoid-ovoid, 3-seeded. Seeds 1.8-2.2 mm long, ovoid-ellipsoid or oblong, generally deep olive green, sometimes brownish green or almost black.