callow
Meanings
- Of a person: having no hair; bald, bare, hairless.
- Of a brick: unburnt.
- Of a young bird, or (part of) its body: having not developed feathers yet; featherless, unfledged; hence, of other animals or their bodies: having no fur or hair; furless, hairless, unfurred.
- Lacking life experience; immature, inexperienced, naive; also, of or relating to something immature or inexperienced.
- In the life cycle of an animal: newly born or hatched; juvenile.
- Synonym of teneral (“of certain insects or other arthropods such as spiders: lacking colour or firmness just after ecdysis (“shedding of the exoskeleton”)”).
- Of land: having no vegetation; bare.
- Synonym of teneral (“an insect or other arthropod such as a spider which has just undergone ecdysis (“shedding of the exoskeleton”) and so lacks colour or firmness”).
- An alluvial flat.
- The upper layer of rubble in a quarry which has to be removed to reach the material to be mined.
- A young bird which has not developed feathers yet; a nestling.
- A person lacking life experience; an immature or naive person.
- Synonym of topsoil (“upper layer of soil”).
- Of land: low-lying and near a river, and thus regularly submerged.
- A low-lying meadow near a river which is regularly submerged.
- A surname.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English calwe (“(adjective) bald; (noun) bald person”), from Old English calu, caluw (“without hair, bald, callow”), from Proto-West Germanic *kalu, from Proto-Germanic *kalwaz (“bald; bare, naked”), and then either: * from Proto-Indo-European *gol(H)-wo- (“bald; bare, naked”), from *gelH- (“head; naked”); or * from Latin calvus (“bald”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kl̥H- (“bald; naked”). If not borrowed from Latin, Grimm’s law indicates that the Latin word is likely a false cognate, along with Persian کل (kal) and Sanskrit कुल्व (kulvá). cognates * Dutch kaal (“bald”) * German kahl (“bald”) * German Low German kahl (“bald”) * Russian го́лый (gólyj, “bare, naked, nude”) * Swedish kal, kalka (“bald”) * West Frisian keal (“bald”)