Japan Flora: Stems 6-30 cm. long, crisped-puberulent and cob­webby, narrowly winged or sometimes wingless; radical and lower cauline leaves petiolate, lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, 4-7.5 cm. long, acuminate, cuneate to truncate at base, irregu­larly toothed, prominendy crisped-puberulent above and along the veinlets beneath, cobwebby on both sides while young, the median and upper leaves gradually smaller, lanceolate; heads 4-8, in dense corymbs; involucres campanulate, 11-12 mm. long and as wide, purplish at the tip and cobwebby; bracts 4- seriate, the outer as long as the inner, broadly lanceolate, long- acuminate, sometimes spreading, the innermost lanceolate, acute; corollas purplish, about 11 mm. long.  Aug.-Sept. Alpine regions.

Hokkaido. Very variable.

f. nivea (Koidz.) Ohwi. Leaves white-tomentose beneath.

f. imperialis (Koidz.) Ohwi. Leaves rather loosely cobwebby on both sides; lower leaves ovate, 9- 10 cm. long, about 5 cm. wide, rather irregularly coarse­toothed. 

f. vestita (Kitam.) Ohwi. Stems about 20 cm. long; lower leaves ovate, 8-9 cm. long, 5-5.5 cm. wide, acuminate, truncate to cordate at base, cobwebby above, densely white-woolly beneath.                  

f. elegans (Koidz.) Ohwi. Stems 18-27 cm. long; radical and lower cauline leaves about 9 cm. long, 4 cm. wide, rounded to cuneate at base, loosely cobwebby on both sides, irregularly coarse-toothed. 

f. angustifolia (Nakai) Ohwi. Stems about 22 cm. long; cauline leaves linear- lanceolate, about 12 cm. long, about 1.2 cm. wide，cuneate at base, petiolate, not decurrent, loosely mucronate-toothed, nearly glabrous on both sides.