Perennial aromatic shrubs; branches quadrangular, becoming terete and woody basally; hairs branched. Leaves sessile, decussate, pinnatifid to entire. Inflorescence dense, compact, spike-like, with overlapping bracts often covering the sessile 3-flowered cymes; bracts many-veined; apex of inflorescence terminated by large, often pale purple bracts. Calyx shortly 4–6-lobed, lobes subequal, except upper lobe continued into a broad terminal appendage; corolla not 2-lipped but slightly zygomorphic, with 3 lower lobes slightly shorter than upper lobes; stamens 4, fertile, anthers with 2 locules fertile, locules scarcely divergent. Mericarps 1-keeled.
About 28 species, mainly from the Mediterranean region, extending to north-east Africa and India; 2 species naturalised in Australia.