barren

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   completely wanting or lacking

   writing barren of insight

2. 2
   adj

   not bearing offspring

   a barren woman

3. 3
   noun

   an uninhabited wilderness that is worthless for cultivation

   the barrens of central Africa

4. 4
   adj

   Not bearing children, childless; hence also unable to bear children, sterile.

   I silently wept as my daughter's husband rejected her. What would she do now that she was no longer a maiden but also barren?

5. 5
   adj

   Of poor fertility, infertile; not producing vegetation; desert, waste.

   barren mountain tracts

6. 6
   adj

   Devoid, lacking.

   August 28, 1731, Jonathan Swift, letter to John Gay But schemes are perfectly accidental. Some will appear barren of hints and matter, but prove to be fruitful.

7. 7
   adj

   Devoid of interest or attraction, poor, bleak.

   As they turned into Hertford Street they startled a robin from the poet's head on a barren fountain, and he fled away with a cameo note.

8. 8
   adj

   Unproductive, fruitless, unprofitable; empty, hollow, vain.

   brilliant but barren reveries

Etymology

From Middle English bareyne, from Anglo-Norman baraigne, baraing (“sterile; barren”), of obscure origin; probably from a Germanic language, perhaps Frankish *baʀ (“bare; barren”), from Proto-Germanic *bazaz (“bare”). If so, a doublet of bare.