Vines woody, not or occasionally turning blackish on drying. Branches 4--6-angulate, shallowly grooved, puberulous. Leaves pinnate; petiole 2.2--48 cm; leaflet blades ovate, narrowly so, or lanceolate, undivided, rarely 2- or 3-lobed, 3--9 × 1--4.6 cm, subleathery or papery, both surfaces conspicuously reticulate, puberulous near base or on midvein, or subglabrous, rarely abaxially densely puberulous, base rounded or broadly cuneate, margin entire; basal veins prominent. Cymes both axillary and terminal, often paniclelike, (1--)5- to many flowered; peduncle 1--4.8 cm; bracts often petiolate, narrowly ovate or lanceolate, and 0.9--2.5 cm, or sessile, linear, and ca. 6 mm. Flowers 1.4--2.6 cm in diam.; pedicel 1.2--3 cm, puberulous. Sepals 4, white, spreading, obovate-oblong, suboblong, or oblanceolate, 7--15 × 3--5(--7) mm, abaxially sparsely appressed puberulous, adaxially glabrous, margin velutinous, apex rounded or obtuse. Stamens 4--6.5 mm, glabrous; filaments linear; anthers linear, sometimes narrowly oblong, (1.5--)2--3(--3.2) mm, apex obtuse or minutely apiculate. Ovaries densely pubescent; style 2.5--4 mm, densely villous. Achenes strongly compressed, elliptic or narrowly so, 5--7 × 3--3.2 mm, appressed puberulous, conspicuously marginate; persistent style 1.8--2.4 cm, tawny villous. Fl. Jun--Sep.

* Scrub, slopes, along streams, on rocks; 100--2000 m. S Anhui, S and W Henan, W Hubei, S Jiangsu, S Shaanxi, S Shanxi, E Sichuan.