Kew Bull. 20: 259 (1966).- Type: Rose Innes GC31536, Burkina Faso, Gaoua (holo- K).
Regional litterature: FWTA: 511 (1972); Ghana grasses: 217, fig 77 (1977); Pl. Burkina Faso: 107 (2012).
Description:
* Short rhizomatous dense leafy branched perennial bunchgrass of up to 0.6 m long, occasionally higher. Culms erect slender. Leaves linear, 15-30 cm long and 2-5 mm broad, expanded towards the apex but folded towards the base, glabrous, scabrid on the margins at the lower side towards the top but smooth and partly hairy towards the base; base barely rounded and passing straight into the sheath; ligule a toothed membrane of 1 mm long; sheath keeled and compressed, the basal ones strongly so, pale to white. Roots stout.
* Inflorescence composed of single terete racemes of 10-18 cm long; rhachis fragile, glabrous; internodes cuneate, 5-7 mm long and 3 mm wide, tip transverse, crateriform. Spikelets squeezed between internode and pedicel. Pedicels linear, foliaceous, curved, 5-6 mm long, glabrous.
* Sessile spikelets elliptic or ovate, 5-7 mm long; callus glabrous, truncate with a central peg. Lower glume oblong, acute, winged on margins, rugose, muticous; upper glume oblong, membranous, rugose, rough in lines, muticous. Lower lemma oblong, 6 mm long, hyaline, 3 -veined; upper lemma oblong, hyaline, acute. Pedicelled spikelets rudimentary, 1 mm long; glumes chartaceous, obtuse, muticous.
Distribution West Africa and world-wide: Burkina Faso and Ghana.