beardless

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English berdles,^[2][3] inherited from Old English beardlēas (“without a beard; youthful”),^[4][2][5] from Old English beard + -lēas, the Old English words that became beard and the suffix -less.^[4][6][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of a person, having no beard, and so young: in Old English glosses on Aldhelm.^[6] The Old English word glosses Latin imberbis, inpubis and ephebus, so it is already used for youths.^[5] Bosworth-Toller at first also gave "a hawk or buzzard", from a gloss with buteo, but its Supplement deleted that meaning and later explained the Latin there as "young man".^[5]

Semantic evolution

The word has always joined the literal sense with the idea of youth: Middle English has both a berdles boy who is simply without a beard and the sense of being under age,^[2] and Gower used it of a father with a youthful face.^[2][7] Johnson (1755) gave "without a beard" and "youthful", quoting Dryden's beardless rout.^[8] Dictionaries still give the senses of youth, immaturity and inexperience.^[3][9] From 1760 it was applied in botany to plants or plant parts without a beard.^[6][3]

Timeline

• Old English – of a person, having no beard; young.^[6][5]
• c. 1330 – the Middle English form berdles, in Otuel.^[2]
• 1760 – in botany, of a plant or plant part lacking a beard.^[6]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Having no beard: a beardless portrait of the old king.^[9][3][6]
2. Too young to grow a beard; youthful, immature or callow.^[9][3][6]
3. (botany) Of a plant such as barley, lacking a beard.^[6][3]

Word family

• beardlessness

Related words

• beard
• bearded

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
8. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
9. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins