Result from Foreign Dictionaries (5 entries found)

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]: Primitive \Prim"i*tive\, a. [L. primitivus, fr. primus the first: cf. F. primitif. See {Prime}, a.] 1. Of or pertaining to the beginning or origin, or to early times; original; primordial; primeval; first; as, primitive innocence; the primitive church. "Our primitive great sire." --Milton. [1913 Webster] 2. Of or pertaining to a former time; old-fashioned; characterized by simplicity; as, a primitive style of dress. [1913 Webster] 3. Original; primary; radical; not derived; as, primitive verb in grammar. [1913 Webster] {Primitive axes of coordinate} (Geom.), that system of axes to which the points of a magnitude are first referred, with reference to a second set or system, to which they are afterward referred. {Primitive chord} (Mus.), that chord, the lowest note of which is of the same literal denomination as the fundamental base of the harmony; -- opposed to derivative. --Moore (Encyc. of Music). {Primitive circle} (Spherical Projection), the circle cut from the sphere to be projected, by the primitive plane. {Primitive colors} (Paint.), primary colors. See under {Color}. {Primitive Fathers} (Eccl.), the acknowledged Christian writers who flourished before the Council of Nice, A. D. 325. --Shipley. {Primitive groove} (Anat.), a depression or groove in the epiblast of the primitive streak. It is not connected with the medullary groove, which appears later and in front of it. {Primitive plane} (Spherical Projection), the plane upon which the projections are made, generally coinciding with some principal circle of the sphere, as the equator or a meridian. {Primitive rocks} (Geol.), primary rocks. See under {Primary}. {Primitive sheath}. (Anat.) See {Neurilemma}. {Primitive streak} or {Primitive trace} (Anat.), an opaque and thickened band where the mesoblast first appears in the vertebrate blastoderm. [1913 Webster] Syn: First; original; radical; pristine; ancient; primeval; antiquated; old-fashioned. [1913 Webster] From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]: Primitive \Prim"i*tive\, n. An original or primary word; a word not derived from another; -- opposed to derivative. [1913 Webster] From WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006) [wn]: primitive adj 1: belonging to an early stage of technical development; characterized by simplicity and (often) crudeness; "the crude weapons and rude agricultural implements of early man"; "primitive movies of the 1890s"; "primitive living conditions in the Appalachian mountains" [syn: {crude}, {primitive}, {rude}] 2: little evolved from or characteristic of an earlier ancestral type; "archaic forms of life"; "primitive mammals"; "the okapi is a short-necked primitive cousin of the giraffe" [syn: {archaic}, {primitive}] 3: used of preliterate or tribal or nonindustrial societies; "primitive societies" 4: of or created by one without formal training; simple or naive in style; "primitive art such as that by Grandma Moses is often colorful and striking" [syn: {primitive}, {naive}] n 1: a person who belongs to an early stage of civilization [syn: {primitive}, {primitive person}] 2: a mathematical expression from which another expression is derived 3: a word serving as the basis for inflected or derived forms; "`pick' is the primitive from which `picket' is derived" From German-English FreeDict Dictionary ver. 0.3.3 [fd-deu-eng]: primitive /priːmiːtiːvə/ primitiv; primitive From Danish-English FreeDict Dictionary ver. 0.2.1 [fd-dan-eng]: primitive 1. fore‐; greatgrand‐ 2. primitive