Plants small, 6–10 mm high, brownish green or yellowish green, in dense or loose tufts. Stems erect, simple, rarely branched. Leaves imbricate, appressed when dry, weakly erect-spreading when moist, broadly ovate to circular, concave, 0.50–0.75 mm long, broadly acute at the apex, ending in a hyaline apical patch; margins strongly revolute, entire; costa slender, excurrent in a long, smooth, hyaline awn, nearly as long as the leaves; upper leaf cells hexagonal to short-rectangular, 12–16 µm wide, thin-walled, cells smooth except for marginal cells, mamillose or papillose on revolute margins; basal cells weakly differentiated, mostly short-rectangular, thin-walled, hyaline, smooth. Autoicous. Setae 7–12 mm long, reddish brown; capsules cylindrical, 1.5–2.5 mm long; peristome teeth linear, divided, densely papillose, with a very low basal membrane; opercula long conic-rostrate; annuli of 2–3 rows of quadrate, vesiculose cells, deciduous. Spores 10–12 µm in diameter, yellowish brown, finely papillose.

Type. Czech Republic: Prague, 1891, Velenovsky s.n.

Chinese specimens examined: NEI MONGOL: He-lan Shan (Mt.), Z.-G. Tong 1175 (X.-L. Bai 1997). QINGHAI: Yushu Co., B. C. Tan 95–1725 (FH, MO).

Habitat: on soil in dry highlands; Distribution: China, Russia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Yugoslavia.

Illustrations: Zander 1993 (Pl. 112, figs. 1–7).