archaic
/ɑːˈkeɪɪk
/adjective
1Very old or old-fashioned: prisons are run on archaic methods...
- The company also plans to pay artists a higher royalty for songs downloaded online, while scrapping archaic methods for calculating Internet sales.
- Director of the Scottish Tourist Forum, Ivan Broussine, warned that archaic attitudes were threatening the health of the tourist industry.
- In short, the modernization of economic structures leads to a rise, rather than a decline, in archaic attitudes of mind.
Synonyms
obsolete, obsolescent, out of date, anachronistic, old-fashioned, outmoded, behind the times, bygone, antiquated, antique, superannuated, antediluvian, past its prime, having seen better days, olde worlde, old-fangled;
ancient, very old, aged, prehistoric, primitive, of yore;
extinct, defunct, discontinued, discarded, fossilized, dead;
French passé, démodé
informal old hat, out of the ark
1.1(Of a word or a style of language) no longer in everyday use but sometimes used to impart an old-fashioned flavour: a term with a rather archaic ring to it...
- They may have translated the archaic terms into scientific-sounding language, but it's the same old vitalism, dressed up as quantum physics.
- Because they are short or perceived as popular, certain archaic words survive in newspaper usage: agog, foe, hustings, scribe, slay.
- Elevation is lent to his language by archaic and poetic words and an admixture of neologisms, while his extensive use of metaphor more closely resembles poetic than prose usage.
1.2Of an early period of art or culture, especially the 7th-6th centuries bc in Greece: the archaic temple at Corinth...
- Schaps, however, underestimates the market orientation of Greek agriculture in the later archaic period.
- This city was settled by Phoenicians in the archaic period and it challenged the rising Roman Republic in three wars culminating in its own destruction in the second century B.C.E.
- Concerning the archaic period, Reed admits that he is engaging in ‘cautious guesswork’.
Derivatives
archaically
/ adverb ...- The archaically worded patent - for an ‘information handling system and terminal apparatus’ - makes passing reference to links within the ‘remote terminal’ network that you might remember as Prestel.
- But archaically the ladies' menus don't show prices.
- I'm self employed, a good chunk of my clients still - archaically - pay by cheque.
Origin
Mid 19th century: from French archaïque, from Greek arkhaikos, from arkhaios, from arkhē 'beginning'.