spiceless

C2+ Topic:Describing Qualities

US /ˈspaɪsləs/ UK /ˈspaɪsləs/ See IPA manual

Meanings

1

adj
lacking spice, flavor, or piquancy; bland

The spiceless stew tasted of little more than warm water.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 adj · lacking spice, flavor, or... bland insipidflavorlesstasteless flat

Opposites

spicy piquant flavorful pungent

Word family

Related forms spice spicy spiciness

Etymology

From spice + -less; spice comes from Old French espice, from Late Latin species ('spices, wares'), from Latin species ('kind, sort').

espice Old French species Latin

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Describing Qualities Word Formation & Derivatives

External links

# spiceless

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** adj
**IPA (US):** /ˈspaɪsləs/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈspaɪsləs/

## Meanings
1. lacking spice, flavor, or piquancy; bland

## Examples
- The spiceless stew tasted of little more than warm water.

## Synonyms
- bland
- insipid
- flavorless
- tasteless
- flat

## Antonyms
- spicy
- piquant
- flavorful
- pungent

## Related Forms
- spice
- spicy
- spiciness

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: espice
- Root: species

## Etymology
From spice + -less; spice comes from Old French espice, from Late Latin species ('spices, wares'), from Latin species ('kind, sort').

## AI Etymology
Spiceless comes from spice + -less; spice comes from Old French espice, from Late Latin species ('spices, wares'), from Latin species ('kind, sort'). The historical chain includes Old French espice and Latin species. Older glosses in the chain include "spices, wares" and "kind, sort", which help explain the semantic range of the modern word. Morphologically, spiceless is best read as compound, suffixal formation, and borrowing, yielding an English adjective shaped by both form history and later usage. In current English it functions as an adjective, with the sense "lacking spice, flavor, or piquancy; bland". related forms include spice, spicy, and spiciness. The result is an English adjective whose etymology preserves the older forms while supporting the word's specialized modern meaning.

## Topics
- Describing Qualities
- Word Formation & Derivatives

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