gustless

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡʌstləs/

Etymology 1

From Latin gustus (“a tasting”), and suffix -less.

Adjective

gustless (comparative more gustless, superlative most gustless)

1. (obsolete) tasteless; insipid
   • 1683, Sir Thomas Browne, Observations Upon Several Plants Mentioned In Scripture:

     […] they might after give the expressed and less useful part of the cods and remaining pulp unto their swine: which, being no gustless or unsatisfying offal, might be well desired by the prodigal in his hunger.

   • 1870, The living temple:

     Again, it is a base abject temper, speaks a mind sunk and lost in carnality, and that, having dethroned and abjured reason, hath abandoned itself to the hurry of vile appetite and sold its liberty and sovereignty for the insipid, gustless pleasures of sense.

   • 1902, Gabriele D'Annunzio, The Dream of a Spring Morning, page 132:

     Graceful and smooth-tongued, the model wife moves through her two scenes with the level charm belonging to Mr. Phillips's gustless but mellow blank verse, to the accentless but even-knit pattern of his plot.

   • 1933, Caradoc Evans, Wasps, page 16:

     She placed her hands on her hips and her stout boots wide apart and bent her body and gaped her mouth and stared at this man who was as gustless as skimmed milk and unsatisfying as water.

Related terms

• degustation
• disgust

Etymology 2

From gust +‎ -less.

Adjective

gustless (comparative more gustless, superlative most gustless)

1. Without gusts (of wind).
   • 1954, Ralph Alger Bagnold, The Physics of Blown Sand and Desert Dunes, page 11:

     Except in broken country, the sand cloud seems to glide steadily over the desert like a moving carpet, and the wind is comparatively gustless.

   • 1957, Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, page 81:

     Unlike fixed-wing aircraft, the rotor experiences oscillatory aerodynamic effects even in steady, gustless forward flight.

   • 1866, George H Strutt, Poems, chiefly lyrical, compiled and arranged by G. H. Strutt, page 187:

     The bland East blows with gustless blast, And constant as this heart to thee, The Hurricane's dread months are past ;

   • 1992, Jennifer Finney Boylan, James Finney Boylan, The planets, →ISBN, page 32:

     A wind sock lay gustless upon a pole.