Annual herb. simple or with long ascending branches, 30-77 cm. Leaves broadly ovate to triangular-ovate, to 8 x 7 cm, acute to rather blunt, sharply and coarsely dentate. Monoecious: male flowers in dense clusters on slender branches of lax axillary inflorescences, female flowers in globose heads mostly c. 1.25 cm diam., solitary on slender axillary peduncles, inner pair of perianth segments finally much accrescent to c. 4 mm and cucullate, densely pilose and setose. Fl. 4. Broken and waste ground, more rarely on hedge banks, 5-30 m

S. Europe, N. Africa, S.W. Asia, adventive elsewhere. Medit. element.