bootless
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English[edit]
Etymology 1[edit]
From Middle English bootles, botelees; equivalent to boot + -less.
Adjective[edit]
bootless (not comparable)
- Without boots.
Etymology 2[edit]
From Middle English boteles, botles, from Old English bōtlēas; equivalent to boot (“profit; use; behoof”) + -less. Doublet of botleas.
Alternative forms[edit]
Adjective[edit]
bootless (comparative more bootless, superlative most bootless)
- Profitless; pointless; unavailing.
- 1609, William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 29”, in Shake-speares Sonnets. […], London: By G[eorge] Eld for T[homas] T[horpe] and are to be sold by William Aspley, →OCLC:
- When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, / I all alone beweep my outcast state / And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries
- 1844, Sir John William Kaye, Peregrine Pultuney: or, Life in India, page 251:
- The lieutenant tried the handle again, but still his efforts were quite bootless. He pushed and kicked, but the door was a strong one.
Synonyms[edit]
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
Categories:
- English terms inherited from Middle English
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms suffixed with -less
- English lemmas
- English adjectives
- English uncomparable adjectives
- English terms inherited from Old English
- English terms derived from Old English
- English doublets
- English terms with quotations