Kew Bull. 20: 288 (1966).- Type: Gossweiler 8739, Angola (holo- K).
Pleiadelphia gossweileri Stapf, in Hooker's Icon. Pl. 32: t. 3121 (1927).
Elymandra monostachya Jacques-Fëlix Type: Jacques-Félix 238, Guinea (holo P).
Regional litterature: FWTA: 498 (1972); Poac. CI: 614, fig. (1995); Fl. Guinée: 458 (2009); Pl. Burkina Faso: 84 (2012)
Description:
* Annual of 0.7-2 m high. Culms erect, 2-4 mm diameter, reddish, glabrous. Leaves 15 -30 cm long and 2-4 mm wide, scabrous, glabrous, tip filiform; ligule an eciliate membrane of 0.5 mm long, scarious, truncate.
* Inflorescence compound, scanty, 30-60 cm long with terminal and axillary solitary racemes. Spatheole linear, 6-7 cm long. Racemes 3-4 cm long bearing only 1 fertile spikelet; rhachis fragile, glabrous. Homogamous spikelets (2 -)6 -14 in number.
* Sessile spikelets elliptic, 12-16 mm long; callus linear 4-6 mm long, pungent, bearded with dark brown hairs. Lower glume elliptic, chartaceous, dark brown, pubescent; upper glume lanceolate, pilose with apical awn of 6-40 mm long. Upper lemma with a geniculate awn of 8-9 cm long; column twisted and hispidulous. Pedicelled spikelets 6-8.5 mm long; callus oblong, 1-1.5 mm long, truncate. Homogamous spikelets 5-8 mm long, glabrous.
Distribution West Africa: Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso.
Distribution world-wide: Gabon, Congo, DRC, and Angola.