Flor. 39: 188 (1856).- Type: Wallich 8828, Népal (holo- LE; iso- K, L, W).
Andropogon lancifolius Trin., Mem. Acad. Sci. Petersb. 6,2: 271 (1832);
Psilopogon figarii De Not., Ind. Sem. Hort. Genuensis (1852). Type: Figari, Sudan (holo- F).
Regional litterature: FTA 9: 165 (1917); FI. Nigeria 87, fig. 40b (1970); FWTA: 470 (1972); Ghana grasses: 101, fig. 8 (1977); Gram. Cameroun: 463, fig. 101 (1992); Fl. Zambesiaca 10,4: 91 (2002); Fl. Guinée: 451 (2009); Pl. Sudan & S Sudan: 119 (2015)
Description:
* Mat forming delicate annual, lax, up to 0.25 m high with widely spaced leaves. Culms straggling, well-branched, often with long aerial roots from the lower nodes. Leaves lanceolate, 2-4 cm long and 3-10 mm broad, fine acuminate tip, flat, delicate soft and glabrous to minutely hairy; base rounded, clasping the culm; ligule a short ciliate membrane; sheath short, finely hairy towards the base.
* Inflorescences of up to 5 very slender, short, silver-hairy subdigitate racemes exserted from the tips of branches with conspicuous spathes. Racemes 1-2 cm long; internodes of rachis fragile, 1-2 mm long; pedicels linear with hairs of 1 mm.
* Sessile spikelets linear, laterally compressed, 2-3 mm long; callus pubescent. Lower glume lanceolate, chartaceous, convex, scaberulose on the nerves; upper glume with a subule of 0.5-1.5 mm long. Upper lemma with hair-like kinked dorsal awn arising 1/5 way up back of lemma, 5-7 mm long with a twisted glabrous column. Pedicelled spikelet lanceolate, 1-2.5 mm long.
Distribution West Africa: Cape Verde, Senegal, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Mali, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, Sudan.
Distribution world-wide: Ethiopia, and E and southern Africa, Asia.