tame

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   very docile

   tame obedience

2. 2
   adj

   brought from wildness into a domesticated state

   tame animals

3. 3
   adj

   very restrained or quiet

   a tame Christmas party

4. 4
   adj

   Docile or tranquil towards humans.

   The lion was quite tame.

5. 5
   adj

   Of a person, well-behaved; not radical or extreme.

   What, for example, were Fraunhofer's lines? McArdle had just been studying the matter with the aid of our tame scientist at the office, and he picked from his desk two of those many-coloured spectral bands which bear a general resemblance to the hat-ribbons of some young and ambitious cricket club.

6. 6
   adj

   Of a non-Westernised person, accustomed to European society.

   The victim was Captain Bickenson, who had gone there from Port Darwin to try the pearling grounds, and for this purpose employed a number of tame blacks about the schooner.

7. 7
   adj

   Not exciting.

   This party is too tame for me.

8. 8
   adj

   Crushed; subdued; depressed; spiritless.

   tame slaves of the laborious plough

Etymology

From Middle English tame, tome, weak inflection forms of Middle English tam, tom, from Old English tam, tom (“domesticated, tame”), from Proto-West Germanic *tam (“tame”), from Proto-Germanic *tamaz (“brought into the home, tame”), from Proto-Indo-European *demh₂- (“to tame, dominate”). Cognate with Scots tam, tame (“tame”), Saterland Frisian tom (“tame”), West Frisian tam (“tame”), Dutch tam (“tame”), Low German Low German tamm, tahm (“tame”), German zahm (“tame”), Danish tam (“tame”), Swedish tam (“tame”), Icelandic tamur (“tame”). The verb is from Middle English tamen, temen, temien, from O…