Annual, rarely biennial, erect or ascending, (20-) 30-90 (-120) cm tall herb, branched, hispid or stiffly hairy with 1-3 mm long, spreading whitish hairs, sometimes subglabrous, rarely glabrous. Leaves large, up to 15 cm long and 6 cm broad; basal and lower leaves ± stalked, larger, and less dissected; upper leaves sessile or subsessile, more dissected with narrow bases; all leaves usually 1-2-pinnatifid with narrow acute, ± toothed, bristle-pointed segments, ±hispid, very variable in size and segmentation but usually with a larger and broader terminal segment. Peduncle (10-) 15-30 cm long, usually stiffly hairy with spreading bristles. Flower bud large, ovoid or broadly ellipsoid, 10-20 mm long, ± stiffly hairy. Flowers very variable in size (3-) 4-8 cm in diam., usually scarlet, violet, pink (rarely whitish), often with a basal dark blotch. Petals suborbicular, 2-4 (-5) cm broad. Stamens as long as the ovary, bluish; filaments linear; anthers c. 1 mm long, oblong. Capsule subglobose to broadly obovoid, 10-20 mm long, usually slightly longer than broad, with a rounded base abruptly narrowed into an inconspicuous very short stipe, glabrous; stigmatic rays 8-12 (-20), almost reaching the end of the somewhat overlapping marginal lobes of the disk: seeds very small, dark-brown.