Barren
['bær(ə)n] or ['bærən]
Definition
(noun.) an uninhabited wilderness that is worthless for cultivation; 'the barrens of central Africa'; 'the trackless wastes of the desert'.
(adj.) completely wanting or lacking; 'writing barren of insight'; 'young recruits destitute of experience'; 'innocent of literary merit'; 'the sentence was devoid of meaning' .
(adj.) not bearing offspring; 'a barren woman'; 'learned early in his marriage that he was sterile' .
Checker: Truman--From WordNet
Definition
(a.) Incapable of producing offspring; producing no young; sterile; -- said of women and female animals.
(a.) Not producing vegetation, or useful vegetation; /rile.
(a.) Unproductive; fruitless; unprofitable; empty.
(a.) Mentally dull; stupid.
(n.) A tract of barren land.
(n.) Elevated lands or plains on which grow small trees, but not timber; as, pine barrens; oak barrens. They are not necessarily sterile, and are often fertile.
Inputed by Jenny
Synonyms and Synonymous
a. [1]. Unprolific, incapable of bearing offspring, not prolific.[2]. Unfertile, fruitless, unproductive, sterile, ACARPOUS.[3]. Scanty, not copious.
Typist: Sol
Synonyms and Antonyms
[See STERILE]
Editor: Lois
Definition
adj. incapable of bearing offspring: unfruitful: dull stupid: unprofitable (with of).—adj. Bar′ren-beat′en.—adv. Bar′renly.—n. Bar′renness.—adjs. Bar′ren-spir′ited; Bar′ren-wit′ted.
Typed by Jolin
Examples
- It is well watered, and its affluent vegetation gains effect by contrast with the barren hills that tower on either side. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- Barren timber for building is of great value in a populous and well-cultivated country, and the land which produces it affords a considerable rent. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- The value of the most barren land is not diminished by the neighbourhood of the most fertile. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- Winter seemed conquering her spring; the mind's soil and its treasures were freezing gradually to barren stagnation. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- The canal extends nearly due south to Suez on the Red Sea, a distance of about 100 miles, through barren wastes of sand and an occasional lake. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- Mercantile stock is equally barren and unproductive with manufacturing stock. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- Reference to these possible applications is necessary in order that the abstraction may be fruitful, instead of a barren formalism ending in itself. John Dewey. Democracy and Education.
- We sailed through the barren Archipelago, and into the narrow channel they sometimes call the Dardanelles and sometimes the Hellespont. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- To preserve these we had quitted England--England, no more; for without her children, what name could that barren island claim? Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
- She went on, with the discord jarring and jolting through her, in the most barren of misery. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- The superior produce of the one class, however, does not, render the other barren or unproductive. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- Or put it, my juvenile friends, that he saw an elephant, and returning said 'Lo, the city is barren, I have seen but an eel,' would THAT be Terewth? Charles Dickens. Bleak House.
- Not so much pain now; but I am hopelessly weak, and the state of my mind is inexpressible--dark, barren, impotent. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- It was strange that she should have chosen to come back and test the full effect of this shapeless, barren ugliness upon herself. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- Without a strong artistic tradition, the life and so the politics of a nation sink into a barren routine. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
Checked by Dick