Trees to 20 m tall, to 0.5(-0.7) m d.b.h. Bark dark gray, longitudinally fissured when old; branchlets gray-white stellate tomentose when young; buds tomentose. Petiole robust, 2-5 cm, stellate tomentose, glabrescent; leaf blade ovate-orbicular, 8-10 × 7-9 cm, abaxially densely gray stellate tomentose, adaxially glabrous, lateral veins 5-7 pairs, base obliquely cordate or truncate, margin dentate, teeth triangular, 1.5-5 mm, with or without awns, 4-7 mm apart, apex acute. Cymes 6-12(-20)-flowered, 6-9 cm; peduncle hairy. Bracts narrowly oblong or narrowly oblanceolate, 5-9 × 1-2.4 cm, adnate to peduncle for 1/3-1/2 of length, abaxially stellate puberulent, adaxially glabrous, base obtuse, apex rounded; stalk 4-5 mm. Pedicel 4-6 mm, hairy. Sepals ca. 5 mm, abaxially stellate puberulent, silky, adaxially villous. Petals 7-8 mm. Stamens as long as sepals; staminodes slightly smaller than petals. Ovary stellate tomentose; style 4-5 mm, glabrous. Fruit globose, ovoid or obovoid, weakly to prominently 5-angled, 7-9 mm, sometimes tuberculate; exocarp woody, indehiscent. Fr. Jul, fr. Sep. 2n = 82.

Hebei, Heilongjiang, N Jiangsu, Jilin, Liaoning, Nei Mongol, Shandong [Japan, Korea, Russia (Siberia)].