leaves few in a cylindric rosette, ca 2 dm long; sheath large, broadly elliptic ovate, livid-lepidote especially beneath; blade acute or acuminate, 55 mm wide, laxly and minutely serrulate or sometimes subentire. inflorescence: peduncle erect, slender, slightly tomentose-lepidote below the nodes; peduncle bracts erect, clasping, narrowly lanceolate, acuminate; fertile part erect, simple, lax, few-flowered, glabrous; rachis straight; floral bracts acuminate from a broadly ovate base, to 4 mm long, glabrous. flowers sessile, 48 mm long; sepals strongly asymmetric, obtuse, to 17 mm long, red with a violet spot at apex, glabrous, with 2 fimbriate scales at base. stamens slightly shorter than the petals, filaments of the second series more than half adnate to the petals. pistil: ovary slenderly cylindric, epigynous tube very large, funnelform.Edited from : Smith & Downs 1979. Bromelioideae (Bromeliaceae) in Flora Neotropica.