Fl. Aegypto-Arab. 178 (1775).- Type: Forsskal, Yemen (holo- C, destr.).
Anthistiria punctata A. Rich., Tent. Fl. Abyss. 2: 448 (1851);
Themeda australis (R. Br.) Stapf, FTA 9: 420 (1919);
Themeda triandra var. punctata (A. Rich.) Stapf, FTA 9: 419 (1919).
Regional litterature: FTA 9:416 (1919); FWTA: 471, fig. 450 (1972); Ghana grasses: 247, fig. 92 (1977); FTEA: 829 (1982); Gram. Cameroun: 509, fig. 111 (1992) ; Poac. CI: 500, fig. (1995) ; Fl. Ethiopia & Eritrea 7: 353, fig (1995); Fl. Guinée: 480 (2009); Pl. Burkina Faso: 117 (2012); Fl. Chad (2013); Pl. Sudan & S Sudan: 150 (2015).
Description:
* Tufted perennial of 1.2-1.8 m high. Culms erect lax branched and leafy, slightly compressed below. Leaves narrowly linear, 15-30 cm long and 4-5 mm wide, flat to partially folded, glabrous with a pale inconspicuous midrib and slightly scabrid margins; base sparsely hairy, passing directly into the sheath; ligule a short pale membrane; sheath glabrous, the basal ones distinctly compressed. Roots robust, well developed.
* Inflorescence a compound spathate panicle of 30 cm long, with terminal and axillary short racemes, 3-8 of them in a capituliformous glomerule supported by an acuminate reddish spatheole of 4-6 cm long, glabrous or with tubercle based hairs. Racemes with a triade of spikelets, one fertile sessile and two pedicelled, inserted in an involucrum of 2 pairs of homogamous spikelets.Peduncles short, filiformous and flexuous.
* Homogamous spikelets 4, subsessile, lanceolate, 10-15 mm long; sterile spikelets similar. Fertile spikelets sessile, elliptic, 5-8 mm long, aristate or muticous, including an punguent sharp, densely rufously bearded callus of 2-4 mm long. Lower glume coriaceous, without keel, more or less hairy or spiny glossy brown. Lower floret reduced to a hyaline lemma; upper lemma hyaline with a dark apical geniculate awn of 4-7 cm long. Caryopse linear lanceolate. Pedicelled and basal spikelets lanceolate, 6-11 mm long.
Distribution West Africa: Cape Verde, Senegal, Guinea, Mali, Ivory Coast, Burkina faso, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, CAR, Chad, Sudan, South Sudan.
Distribution world-wide: Morocco, Algeria, Tunesia, DRC, Ethiopia, Uganda and NE, E and southern Africa, Asia, Australia.