Tufted perennial without rhizomes; culms 30-60 cm high, erect, slender. Leaf-blades flat or folded, 5-20 cm long, 2-5 mm wide, scaberulous above, smooth beneath. Spike lax, 8-15 cm long (excluding the awns), erect or nodding; rhachis joints scabrid along the margins. Spikelets 4-5-flowered, 14-16 mm long (excluding the awns); glumes subequal, oblong-elliptic, 7-11 mm long, acuminate; lemma oblong-lanceolate, 10-12 mm long (excluding the awn), minutely bristly on the back, especially towards the margins, with a stout straight awn 1-2 cm long; palea as long as the body of the lemma; anthers c.2.5 mm long.