Kew Bull. 1936: 312 (1936).- Type: Pobeguin 1092, Guinea (holo- K).
Regional litterature: FWTA: 390 (1972); Gram. Cameroun: 120, fig. 26 (1992); Fl. Guinée: 460 (2009).
Description:
* Densely cespitose perennial, 0.3-0.5 m high. Basal sheaths bulbously swollen, yellow, hardened below.Culms erect. Leaves linear to filiform, convolute, 10-15 cm long and 0.5-2 mm wide, setaceous, pilose on both sides with tubercle-based hairs.
* Inflorescence a linear to lanceolate panicle, 3-20 cm long and 0.5-2 cm broad, contracted about the short primary branches, almost racemose, bearing up to 15 spikelets; tufts of hairs in the axils. Spikelets on stiff pedicels of 0.5-6 mm long.
* Spikelets narrowly oblong, 3-5 mm wide and 7-18 mm long, pallid to olive-grey. Glumes deciduous, 2-2.5 mm long, lanceolate, violette green. Lemmas 3-4 mm long, free at tip, acute to acuminate, coriaceous, sometimes a few hairs near the tip, disarticulating from the tip; paleas 3.4 mm long, coriaceous; palea keels winged, scabrid. Anthers 3, 1.5 mm long. Caryopsis ellipsoid, 1.4 mm long.
Note: Variable species. Close to E racemosa.
Distribution West Africa and world-wide: Senegal, Guinea, Ghana, Cameroon.