Description from
Flora of China
Quercus thorelii Hickel & A. Camus, Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. 29: 599. 1923; Q. hsiensiui Chun & W. C. Ko.
Trees to 30 m tall. Branchlets sulcate, densely with tawny stellate hairs when young, glabrescent, lenticellate; lenticels whitish, small. Petiole 1-3 cm, hairy, glabrescent; leaf blade ovate to oblong-elliptic, 12-17 × 3.5-7 cm, subleathery, light orangish brown tomentose when young, glabrescent, abaxially grayish brown, adaxially bright green, base broadly cuneate to subrounded, margin entire near base but otherwise spinose serrate, apex acute to caudate; midvein adaxially raised; secondary veins 13-16 on each side of midvein, branching near margin; tertiary veins abaxially slender, evident. Cupule bowl-shaped to cupular, 1.5-2 × ca. 3 cm, enclosing most of nut and ca. 0.5 mm longer than it, apically incurved, outside and inside tawny tomentose, wall ca. 2 mm thick; bracts in 8 or 9(-12) rings, margin subentire. Nut oblate, 1-1.5 × 2.5-3 cm, densely light brown tomentose, apex depressed; scar ca. 2 cm in diam., flat. Fl. Apr, fr. Sep-Oct.
Broad-leaved evergreen forests in mountain valleys; 1000-1100 m. S Guangxi, S Yunnan [Laos, Vietnam]