9. Section Divisae H. Christ

Plants monoecious or dioecious, with long-creeping rhizomes, forming loose colonies of tufts. Vegetative growth present, consisting of basal leaves with overlapping sheaths. Flowering stems erect or ascending, glabrous, light brown to brown at the base. Leaves basal or nearly so, glabrous. Leaf blades light green, the margins minutely roughened or toothed, flat or more commonly folded longitudinally. Leaf sheaths with the tip truncate or nearly so, the ligule wider than long and rounded, the ventral side thin, white to light brown, lacking vertical, green lines, the lowermost sheath bases light brown to nearly black, the remains of previous years’ leaves persistent, degrading into a mass of fibers. Inflorescences with few to numerous spikes, these mostly crowded into a headlike mass at the stem tip, the individual spikes sometimes difficult to differentiate, ascending to spreading, the bracts scalelike, ovate to linear, usually awned at the tip, shorter than the spikes, lacking a sheath. Spikes all pistillate or staminate, or staminate toward the tip and pistillate toward the base, sessile, broadly ovate-elliptic in outline, 1–2 times as long as wide. Staminate scales narrowly elliptic-ovate to ovate, rounded to more commonly sharply pointed at the tip, straw-colored to brown with lighter margins and frequently a green or straw-colored midrib. Pistillate scales as long as or slightly longer than the perigynia and usually concealing them, ovate to obovate, pointed at the tip and occasionally short-awned, straw-colored to brown with lighter margins and frequently a green or straw-colored midrib. Perigynia ascending, unequally biconvex with 1 side flattened and the other side broadly rounded, ovate, the margins angled but not winged, tapered to a beak with minute teeth along the margins and 2 narrow teeth at the tip, angled or rounded below the fruit to a minute, stalklike base, glabrous. Styles withering during fruit development, jointed to the main body of the fruit, which is minutely beaked at maturity. Stigmas 2. Fruits ovate-elliptic in outline, biconvex and somewhat flattened in cross-section, yellowish brown. About 12 species, North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa.