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Description:
Plants generally small, 9‑15 cm high but occasionally to 35 cm, sparsely branched. Corm 8‑12 mm in diam., tunics brown to grey, densely fibrous, the outer layers becoming finely fibrous and reticulate. Cataphylls 2, the inner pale and membranous, reaching shortly above the ground, the outer shorter and dark brown. Leaves 3, the lower 2 at least usually inserted near ground level, the lowermost longest and about as long as, to slightly exceeding the inflorescence, lanceolate, 3‑5 mm wide in the midline. Stem compressed and 2‑3‑angled, sometimes narrowly winged above. Inflorescence a spike or few‑ branched pseudopanicle, the main axis 5‑7 flowered, the secondary axes with fewer flowers; bracts herbaceous, often flushed red to purple, becoming dry in late flower, 6‑8(‑10) mm long, the outer nearly always exceeding the inner. Flower zygomorphic, violet, the lower three tepals each with a white median streak edged with a darker band of purple in the lower midline; perianth tube more or less straight, narrowly funnel‑shaped, ca. 9 mm long; tepals unequal, lanceolate, the lower three horizontal to descending, held close together and forming a lip, ca. 9 mm long, to 2 mm wide, the upper three larger, the uppermost more or less erect, the upper laterals reflexed, ca. 9 mm long, to 3 mm wide. Filaments ca. 6 mm long, unilateral, exserted 3 mm from the tube; anthers parallel and contiguous, ca. 3 mm long, pale grey; pollen whitish. Ovary ovate‑obovate, ca. 2 mm long, style unilateral, arching behind the stamens, dividing between the middle and apex of the anthers, branches ca. 2 mm long, barely notched apically. Capsules globose‑trigonous, 3‑4 mm long, showing the outline of the seeds; seeds red‑brown, globose, ca. 1.2 mm in diam. Chromosome number 2n = 8. Flowering time: late August to early October.
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