different between bloodless vs ghostly

English

Alternative forms

• bloudless (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English blodles, from Old English bl?dl?as (“bloodless”), equivalent to blood +? -less. Cognate with Dutch bloedeloos (“bloodless”), German blutlos (“bloodless”), Danish blodløs (“bloodless”), Swedish blodlös (“bloodless”), Icelandic blóðlaus (“bloodless”).

Adjective

bloodless (comparative more bloodless, superlative most bloodless)

1. Lacking blood; ashen, anaemic.
   • c. 1593, William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus, Act III, Scene 1,^[1]

     Thou dost not slumber: see, thy two sons’ heads,

     Thy warlike hand, thy mangled daughter here:

     Thy other banish’d son, with this dear sight

     Struck pale and bloodless; and thy brother, I,

     Even like a stony image, cold and numb.

   • 1956, James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room, Penguin, 2001, Part One, Chapter 2,

     The face was white and thoroughly bloodless with some kind of foundation cream; it stank of powder and a gardenia-like perfume.

2. Taking place without loss of blood.

   a bloodless conquest; a bloodless coup d'état; a bloodless revolution; a bloodless victory

3. Lacking emotion, passion or vivacity.
   • 1937, “No. 1 Rumanian,” Time, 8 February, 1937,^[2]

     Those Philharmonic subscribers who considered Guest Conductor Igor Stravinsky too bloodless and ascetic […] last week found his successor, Georges Enesco, more to their taste.

Derived terms

• bloodlessly
• bloodlessness

Translations

English

Etymology

From Middle English gostly, gastlich, from Old English g?stl?? (“spiritual, holy, clerical (not lay), ghastly, ghostly, spectral”), equivalent to ghost +? -ly. Cognate with Scots gostly, gastly, gaistlie (“spiritual, ghastly, terrifying”), West Frisian geastlik (“spiritual, clerical, religious”), Dutch geestelijk (“spiritual, clerical, ecclesiastical”), German geistlich (“spiritual, sacred, religious”), Danish geistlig (“ecclesiastical, clerical”).

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /??o?stli/

Adjective

ghostly (comparative ghostlier, superlative ghostliest)

1. Of or pertaining to ghosts or spirits.

2. Spooky; frightening.
   • 1929, Robert Dean Frisbee, The Book of Puka-Puka (republished by Eland, 2019; p. 35):

     Scores of coconut-shell fires blazed with their characteristic glaring white flame, throwing grotesque shadows on the brown thatched huts, dancing in fairylike shimmerings among the domes of coconut fronds, casting ghostly reaches of light through the adjacent graveyards, and silhouetting the forms of pareu-clad natives at work cleaning their fish or laying them on the live coals to broil.

   • 2019, Dave Eggers, The Parade, Vintage Books N.Y., p. 134

     His lips were chapped and lined with a ghostly purple fringe.

3. Relating to the soul; not carnal or secular; spiritual.

   a ghostly confessor

   • Save and defend us from our ghostly enemies.

   • 1650, Jeremy Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living

     one of the ghostly children of St. Jerome

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:ghostly

Translations

See also

• ghastly