Perennial herbaceous plant with climbing stems up to 2 m long. The leaves are elliptical or lanceolate, arranged in whorls of 4-6, narrowed into a petiole, prickly-rough. The flowers are small, yellowish-greenish, in axillary semi-umbels; corolla wheel-shaped, without tube. The fruit consists of 2 halves, black.
Grows on edges, in bushes, near hedges. It occurs sporadically in the lowlands and foothills of the North Caucasus.
Medicinal raw materials are rhizomes and roots harvested in the fall, after seeding. Rhizomes and roots contain oxy-hydroxymethylanthraquinones and their derivatives, ruberitric acid, which, when oxidized, forms alizarin, xanthopurpurine, pseudopurpurine, rubiadin.
Preparations from rhizomes and roots are recommended for kidney and gallstone disease.