Large shrubs to trees, usually 3-14 m tall. Bark gray-black. Branchlets first sparsely pubescent or densely villous, glabrate after. Petiole 7-15 mm, pubescent or glabrate; leaf blade narrowly lanceolate, lanceolate, oblanceolate, obovate, or obovate-lanceolate, 3-16 × 1-4(-4.5) cm, leathery to thickly leathery, abaxially sometimes glaucous, first pubescent, gradually glabrate after, adaxially glabrous or hairy when young, midrib adaxially impressed (elevated in var. cavaleriei), lateral veins 8-12 pairs, abaxially elevated, veinlets slightly distinct, base attenuate and decurrent, rarely cuneate, apex caudate-acuminate, acuminate, or obtuse. Inflorescences 2-10(-12), paniculate or subracemose, branched near top of peduncle, pubescent to puberulent. Flowers 4-5 mm, hairy. Perianth lobes somewhat unequal, outer ones shorter and narrower, apex obtuse, hairy on both surfaces especially inside. Filaments villous, those of 3rd series with sessile glands at base. Staminodes stipitate, villous. Ovary globose; style elongated; stigma dish-shaped. Fruit ovoid, ca. 1 cm × 7 mm; fruiting pedicel not enlarged or slightly thickened; persistent perianth lobes lax, leathery, longitudinally veined, apex sometimes extrorse. Fl. May, fr. Aug-Oct.

● Mountain slopes or valleys, dense forests, limestone hills, thickets, watersides. Gansu, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Yunnan.