CHILDLESS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does childless mean? 

• CHILDLESS (adjective)
  The adjective CHILDLESS has 1 sense:

1. without offspring

  Familiarity information: CHILDLESS used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CHILDLESS (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Without offspring

Context example:

in some societies a childless woman is rejected by her tribesmen

Similar:

unfruitful (not fruitful; not conducive to abundant production)

Derivation:

childlessness (the condition of being without offspring)

 Context examples 

One by one, her brothers and sister died; and her mother, with the exception of her neglected daughter, was left childless.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

The childless old lady had offered to adopt one of the girls when the troubles came, and was much offended because her offer was declined.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

So greatly did they desire to have one, that the wife prayed for it day and night, but still they remained childless.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

If I had been a casual passer-by, I should have probably supposed that some childless person lay dead in it.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Thorpe's interest in the family, by his sister's approaching connection with one of its members, and his own views on another (circumstances of which he boasted with almost equal openness), seemed sufficient vouchers for his truth; and to these were added the absolute facts of the Allens being wealthy and childless, of Miss Morland's being under their care, and—as soon as his acquaintance allowed him to judge—of their treating her with parental kindness.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)