lifeless
/ˈlʌɪfləs
/adjective
1Dead or apparently dead: his lifeless body was taken from the river...
- Sitting on his knees he embraced the dead bloody woman in his arms, feeling her cold lifeless body against his hot chest.
- The dirty grey pavements were littered with cold, lifeless bodies and the only sound came from the biting autumn wind as it ripped through the trees and chilled him to the bone.
- She pressed her forehead to his own, and his entire body was cold, lifeless.
Synonyms
dead, deceased, defunct, departed, late, extinct, perished, gone, no more, passed on/away, stiff, cold, (as) dead as a doornail
rare demised, exanimate
1.1Lacking vigour, vitality, or excitement: dull and lifeless hair...
- The left wing think tanks, for instance, are now lifeless, dull and lacking in ideas.
- The man who looked back at him was well-muscled and tall, but his eyes were tired and dull, his light brown hair flat and lifeless.
- Generally dry hair is unmanageable, lifeless, dull, frizzy and/or flyaway.
Synonyms
lacklustre, spiritless, lacking vitality, apathetic, torpid, lethargic;
dull, monotonous, boring, tedious, dreary, insipid, unexciting, wearisome, bland, drab, dry, flat, static, stiff, wooden, mechanical, uninspired, inexpressive, expressionless, emotionless, colourless, characterless, two-dimensional, uninspiring
lank, lustreless
2Devoid of living things: the lifeless landscapes of the moon...
- There was a long pause as the two stared out over the grim and lifeless landscape.
- The landscape appears to be lifeless, but is home to an array of insects and wildlife.
- The cave is not a lifeless place, it is a living thing to which we have to give ourselves; a thing that can be gentle and also be a savage whom changes in temper can render dangerous.
Synonyms
barren, sterile, bare, desolate, stark, arid, infertile, uncultivated, empty, uninhabited, unoccupied;
cold, bleak, joyless, colourless, characterless, soulless
Derivatives
lifelessly
/ adverb ...- It merely plods lifelessly from one incident to the next, without any sense or urgency or involvement.
- For some ungodly reason the lunatic newspaper had decided that it was thrilled by the idea of listen to me jabber on about any decaying rubbish that fell lifelessly out of my mouth.
- If you wear it without a tie, then the collar kind of flops down lifelessly - which, as a stiff pointed collar, it shouldn't do.
lifelessness
/ noun ...- Although the colour and perm may lighten your face, hair care poses a big problem to many women, for constant setting, colouring and blow-drying may easily result in dryness, dullness and lifelessness.
- If we inadvertently ‘pollute’ Mars with earth life before we get a chance to either confirm Mars' lifelessness or study its ecologies, then we mess up a huge chance at understanding and studying the nature of life on the grandest scale yet.
- Called the Golem, it protected the Jews of Prague until the Rabbi Löw decided it had become a danger and rubbed out the holy name written on its forehead, reverting it to lifelessness.
Origin
Old English līflēas (see life, -less).