Its vernacular name in Maltese is xewk isfar kbir, meaning "large yellow fin", cardogna maggiore in Italian, scoddi on Sicily, and scolyme à grandes fleurs in French.

The rosette leaves are usually 10-16, exceptionally up to 24 cm long and ovate to oblong in shape, pinnately incised, with a wavy, spiny and dentate margin.

[4] The flowerheads are seated at the end of the stem or in the limbs of the higher leaves, and are arranged in a spike, which are subtended by two or three leaflike bracts.

These surround the common floral base (or receptacle), which is mostly 13–18 mm in diameter conical in shape and is set with ovate papery bracts called chaff or paleae.

The yellow to yolk-yellow, strap-like corolla is usually 25–37 mm long, ends in five teeth, and does not carry black hair.

These parts sit on an inferior ovary that grows into an indehiscent fruit in which only one seed develops (a so-called cypsela).

[4] Golden thistles are assigned to the Cichorieae tribe that shares anastomosing latex canals in both root, stem and leaves, and has flower heads only consisting of one type of floret.

[4] S. grandiflorus is an annual or biennial of up to ¾ m high with one, two or three leaflike bracts subtending each cluster of flowerheads and these are spiny dentate.

S. hispanicus is an annual, biennial or perennial of up to 1¾ m high and it also has one, two or three spiny dentate leaflike bracts subtending each cluster of flowerheads and the yellow, orange or white florets also lack black hairs.

It further occurs in Lebanon, Turkey, Italy (Sicily, Sardinia, Lombardia, Tuscany, Basilicata, Calabria, Puglia and Abruzzo), and in France (the coast of the Languedoc-Roussillon region, the departement Bouches-du-Rhône and on southern Corsica), but has a patchy distribution in these parts.