Adjacent Words

Lifeless definitions

	Tweet

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

LI'FELESS, a.
1. Dead; deprived of life; as a lifeless body.
2. Destitute of life; unanimated; as lifeless matter.
3. Destitute of power, force, vigor or spirit; dull; heavy; inactive.
4. Void of spirit; vapid; as liquor.
5. Torpid.
6. Wanting physical energy.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: deprived of life; no longer living; "a lifeless body" [syn: lifeless, exanimate]
2: destitute or having been emptied of life or living beings; "after the dance the littered and lifeless ballroom echoed hollowly"
3: lacking animation or excitement or activity; "the party being dead we left early"; "it was a lifeless party until she arrived"
4: not having the capacity to support life; "a lifeless planet"

Merriam Webster's

adjective Date: before 12th century having no life: a. dead b. inanimate c. lacking qualities expressive of life and vigor ; insipid d. destitute of living beings • lifelessly adverb • lifelessness noun

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. 1 lacking life; no longer living. 2 unconscious. 3 lacking movement or vitality. Derivatives: lifelessly adv. lifelessness n. Etymology: OE lifleas (as LIFE, -LESS)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Lifeless Life"less, a. Destitute of life, or deprived of life; not containing, or inhabited by, living beings or vegetation; dead, or apparently dead; spiritless; powerless; dull; as, a lifeless carcass; lifeless matter; a lifeless desert; a lifeless wine; a lifeless story. -- Life"less*ly, adv. -- Life"less*ness, n. Syn: Dead; soulless; inanimate; torpid; inert; inactive; dull; heavy; unanimated; spiritless; frigid; pointless; vapid; flat; tasteless. Usage: Lifeless, Dull, Inanimate, Dead. In a moral sense, lifeless denotes a want of vital energy; inanimate, a want of expression as to any feeling that may be possessed; dull implies a torpor of soul which checks all mental activity; dead supposes a destitution of feeling. A person is said to be lifeless who has lost the spirits which he once had; he is said to be inanimate when he is naturally wanting in spirits; one is dull from an original deficiency of mental power; he who is dead to moral sentiment is wholly bereft of the highest attribute of his nature.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

1. If a person or animal is lifeless, they are dead, or are so still that they appear to be dead. Their cold-blooded killers had then dragged their lifeless bodies upstairs to the bathroom... ADJ 2. If you describe an object or a machine as lifeless, you mean that they are not living things, even though they may resemble living things. It was made of plaster, hard and white and lifeless, bearing no resemblance to human flesh. ADJ 3. A lifeless place or area does not have anything living or growing there at all. Dry stone walls may appear stark and lifeless, but they provide a valuable habitat for plants and animals. ADJ 4. If you describe a person, or something such as an artistic performance or a town as lifeless, you mean they lack any lively or exciting qualities. ...a lifeless portrait of an elderly woman. ADJ [disapproval]

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Dead, defunct, extinct, inanimate. 2. Torpid, sluggish, inert, dull, tame, spiritless, passive.

Moby Thesaurus

abeyant, abiotic, apathetic, arid, asleep, asleep in Jesus, at rest, azoic, bare, barren, benumbed, bereft of life, blah, blank, blase, bleak, bloodless, bored, boring, breathless, called home, carrion, cataleptic, catatonic, characterless, cold, colorless, croaked, dead, dead and gone, deadened, death-struck, debilitated, deceased, defunct, demised, departed, departed this life, desert, desolate, destitute of life, dismal, done for, dopey, dormant, drab, draggy, drearisome, dreary, droopy, drugged, dry, dryasdust, dull, dumb, dusty, effete, elephantine, empty, enervated, etiolated, exanimate, extinct, fade, fallen, finished, flat, food for worms, foul, gone, gone to glory, gone west, groggy, heavy, hebetudinous, ho-hum, hollow, in abeyance, in suspense, inactive, inane, inanimate, inanimated, inert, inexcitable, insensate, insensible, insentient, insipid, jaded, jejune, lackadaisical, lackluster, languid, languorous, late, late lamented, latent, launched into eternity, leaden, lethargic, listless, logy, low-spirited, lumpish, lusterless, martyred, mat, moribund, mute, no more, nonconscious, nonliving, numb, pale, pallid, passed on, passive, pedestrian, phlegmatic, plodding, pointless, poky, ponderous, pooped, prosaic, prosy, pushing up daisies, released, reposing, resting easy, sainted, sated, sedentary, senseless, slack, sleeping, sleepy, slow, sluggish, slumbering, smitten with death, smoldering, solemn, somber, somnolent, soulless, spiritless, stagnant, stagnating, stale, standing, static, sterile, stiff, still, stillborn, stodgy, stuffy, stultified, superficial, supine, suspended, taken away, taken off, tame, tasteless, tedious, tiresome, torpid, unanimated, unaroused, unconscious, unfeeling, uninhabited, uninteresting, unlively, unmoving, unoccupied, vapid, vegetable, vegetative, wan, waste, weary, with the Lord, with the saints, without life, without vital functions, wooden, world-weary