Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Biology Headless or lacking a clearly defined head.
- adjective Having no leader.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Without a head; headless: applied
- Without a leader or chief.
- Wanting a distinct beginning; indefinite in subject.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Headless.
- adjective (Zoöl.) Without a distinct head; -- a term applied to bivalve mollusks.
- adjective (Bot.) Having the style spring from the base, instead of from the apex, as is the case in certain ovaries.
- adjective Without a leader or chief.
- adjective Wanting the beginning.
- adjective (Pros.) Deficient at the beginning, as a line of poetry.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective
Headless - adjective zoology Without a distinct head; -- a term applied to
bivalve mollusks . - adjective botany Having the style spring from the base, instead of from the apex, as is the case in certain
ovaries - adjective Without a leader or chief.
- adjective Wanting the beginning
- adjective prosody
Deficient in the beginning, as a line of poetry that is missing its expected opening syllable - Brande
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective lacking a head or a clearly defined head
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
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Examples
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The state had been erected upon lessons learned through centuries trying to maintain peace within an insular acephalous tribal society with a penchant for infighting and was most functional when it resembled a "loose" confederation in which legislative and judicial powers were pushed down to the local level - a concept analogous to America's states' rights.
Michael Hughes: Afghanistan Corrupted by U.S. and 30 Years of Foreign Meddling Michael Hughes 2010
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The state had been erected upon lessons learned through centuries trying to maintain peace within an insular acephalous tribal society with a penchant for infighting and was most functional when it resembled a "loose" confederation in which legislative and judicial powers were pushed down to the local level - a concept analogous to America's states' rights.
Michael Hughes: Afghanistan Corrupted by U.S. and 30 Years of Foreign Meddling Michael Hughes 2010
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The state had been erected upon lessons learned through centuries trying to maintain peace within an insular acephalous tribal society with a penchant for infighting and was most functional when it resembled a "loose" confederation in which legislative and judicial powers were pushed down to the local level - a concept analogous to America's states' rights.
Michael Hughes: Afghanistan Corrupted by U.S. and 30 Years of Foreign Meddling Michael Hughes 2010
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The state had been erected upon lessons learned through centuries trying to maintain peace within an insular acephalous tribal society with a penchant for infighting and was most functional when it resembled a "loose" confederation in which legislative and judicial powers were pushed down to the local level - a concept analogous to America's states' rights.
Michael Hughes: Afghanistan Corrupted by U.S. and 30 Years of Foreign Meddling Michael Hughes 2010
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John: another of their great exchanges (about then Brave Jeff Francoeur) was preserved here at blog I can't link to, but if you Google "Hernandez awkward introductions acephalous" you can find it. keith hernandez and his dog, duncan
The Anti-Homers 2009
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John: another of their great exchanges (about then Brave Jeff Francoeur) was preserved here at blog I can't link to, but if you Google "Hernandez awkward introductions acephalous" you can find it. keith hernandez and his dog, duncan
The Anti-Homers 2009
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John: another of their great exchanges (about then Brave Jeff Francoeur) was preserved here at blog I can't link to, but if you Google "Hernandez awkward introductions acephalous" you can find it. keith hernandez and his dog, duncan
The Anti-Homers 2009
-
John: another of their great exchanges (about then Brave Jeff Francoeur) was preserved here at blog I can't link to, but if you Google "Hernandez awkward introductions acephalous" you can find it. keith hernandez and his dog, duncan
The Anti-Homers 2009
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This excerpt sums up the modus operandi of a rogue vice presidency in an at-times acephalous executive branch:
William E. Jackson Jr.: The Vices of Cheney: The Burden is Upon the House Judiciary Committee 2008
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On the one hand, by providing formerly acephalous societies with formal leaders and symbols of legitimate (that is, VOC-enforced) authority, the company managed to integrate these societies into a greater chain of command: Elders commanded villages, governor commanded elders, governor-general commanded governor, etc.
mollusque commented on the word acephalous
What marvel, that we have sold our birth-right to an acephalous mollusk, when the simple use of the tongue has passed into such headless mongreldom?
--Richard Blackmore, 1884, Tommy Upmore
November 11, 2007
qms commented on the word acephalous
Astride his dark snorting Bucephalus
Whose thundering hoofbeats can deafen us,
The horseman delights
In haunting our nights,
More horrid because he’s acephalous.
October 29, 2018