Biennials or perennials, 50-100 cm. herbage not spiny. Stems erect, branched. Leaves basal and cauline; petiolate (basal) or sessile (cauline); blade margins ± lobed (proximal) or dentate or lobed (distal), sparsely hirsute (basal and proximal cauline) or glabrous (distal cauline) . Heads radiant, borne singly. Involucres ovoid to spheric, 10-15 mm diam. Phyllaries many in 6-8 series, unequal, appressed, ovate. margins entire, apices obtuse to acute. narrowly membranous fringed, each with a short deciduous spine. Receptacles flat, epaleate, long-bristly. Florets many; outer neuter, corollas expanded and ± raylike, ± bilateral, staminodes present; inner fertile, corollas purple (rarely white), radial, tubes very slender, throats narrowly funnelform, lobes linear; anther bases tailed, apical appendages oblong; style branches: fused portions with minutely hairy nodes, distinct portions minute. Cypselae ± barrel-shaped, ± compressed, with elaiosomes ribbed, transversely roughened, apices without prominent collars, smooth, faces glabrous, basal attachment scars oblique or lateral; pappi of several series, outer of stiff, scabrous bristles. inner a single abaxial scale. x = 9, 10, 11.