Tupistra delavayi Franchet, Bull. Soc. Bot. France 43: 40. 1896.

Rhizome brownish, terete, 1--1.5 cm thick, stout; nodes dense. Leaves 3 or 4, basal, slightly distichous equitant; petiole 8--12 cm; leaf blade lorate-lanceolate, 25--45 × 5--9 cm, subleathery. Spike 5--6 × 1.5--1.7 cm, densely many flowered; peduncle 4.5--10 cm; fertile bracts white or pale brown, ovate to deltoid-lanceolate, 4--7 × 4--5 mm, membranous, margin not fimbriate. Perianth yellow, tubular-campanulate, 7--11 mm, fleshy; tube 4--6 mm; lobes ovate or suborbicular, 2--3 × 2.5--3 mm. Ovary oblong-ovoid, ca. 4.5 mm. Style usually very short or inconspicuous; stigma 3-lobed. Berry purple-red at maturity, subglobose, 6--10 mm in diam. Fl. Apr, fr. Aug. 2 n = 38*.

* Moist places in broad-leaved forests, thickets; 1000--1500 m. Guangxi, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan, Yunnan.