Vern.: ‘Safed Zira’.

Plants slender, 15-30 cm tall, branched. Leaves much divided into filiform segments. Involucre of 5-6 linear, entire or ternate bracts with linear segments. Rays 3-6, 5 mm to 1 cm long. Involucel of long linear, white margined bractlets, 5-10 mm long. Calyx teeth prominent, acute, persistent. Petals rose coloured, unequal. Fruit oblong, 5-6 mm long, setulose; stylopodium conical; styles short, erect; vittae solitary under the secondary ridges; commissure 2-vittate

Type locality: Egypt.

Distribution: North Africa, Mediterranean Region, Middle East, Central Asia, W. Pakistan; adventive in N. America.

A species possibly indigenous to the upper Nile region in Egypt and cultivat¬ed in many places in the Mediterranean region and elsewhere. The fruit is used medicinally for digestive ailments and is also used as a spice