Celtis bodinieri H. Léveillé; C. bungeana var. pubipedicella G. H. Wang; C. cercidifolia C. K. Schneider; C. hunanensis Handel-Mazzetti; C. labilis C. K. Schneider; C. nervosa Hemsley; C. tetrandra Roxburgh subsp. sinensis (Persoon) Y. C. Tang.

Trees, to 20 m tall, deciduous. Bark gray. Branchlets brown, brown pubescent, sometimes glabrescent late in season. Winter buds dark brown, 1-3 mm, glabrous or inconspicuously puberulent. Stipules linear to lanceolate, 3-5 mm, pubescent, fugacious. Petiole brown, 3-10 mm, pubescent, adaxially with a broad and shallow furrow; leaf blade ovate to ovate-elliptic, 3-10 × 3.5-6 cm, thickly papery, abaxially usually inconspicuously yellowish brown puberulent when young, abaxially with hairs scattered on major veins and sometimes tufted in vein axils with age, base rounded, obtuse, or obliquely truncate, ± symmetric to moderately oblique, margin subentire to crenate on apical half, teeth 0-16 on each side, apex acute to shortly acuminate; secondary veins 3 or 4 on each side of midvein. Flowers fascicled in leaf axils and stem bases. Style branches linear, undivided. Infructescences unbranched, 1(-3) per leaf axil, rather stout, pubescent at least proximally, 4-10 mm; fruiting pedicel 1-1.5 × as long as subtending petiole. Drupe ± globose, 5-7(-8) mm in diam. Stone white, ± globose, reticulately foveolate, ribbed. Fl. Mar-Apr, fr. Sep-Oct.

Roadsides, slopes; 100-1500 m. Anhui, Fujian, Gansu, Guangdong, Guizhou, Henan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, NE Shandong, Sichuan, Taiwan, Zhejiang [Japan].