Low frutescent or suffrutescent formations of the supra-Mediterranean levels of the Iberian Meseta and its surrounding mountains and of northern Spain and southern France, rich in small labiate shrubs of genera Thymus, Teucrium, Salvia, Satureja, Sideritis, Lavandula, accompanied by leguminous shrubs (Genista scorpius, Genista pilosa, Genista pseudopilosa, Genista cinerea ssp. speciosa, Coronilla minima, Dorycnium pentaphyllum ssp. pentaphyllum) and various grasses (Stipa spp., Brachypodium spp.). In the north they often have an important, sometimes predominant, grass element and their impoverished shrub component is sometimes reduced to an almost monospecific Thymus formation; southwards, they become progressively more dominated by a richer constellation of shrub species.