nameless

adjective

name·​less ˈnām-ləs 

1

: obscure, undistinguished

2

: not known by name : anonymous

3

: having no legal right to a name (as due to being born to parents not married to each other)

4

: not having been given a name : unnamed

5

: not marked with a name

a nameless grave

6

a

: incapable of precise description : indefinable

b

: too repulsive or distressing to describe

namelessly adverb

namelessness noun

Synonyms

• anonymous
• faceless
• incognito
• innominate
• unbaptized
• unchristened
• unidentified
• unnamed
• untitled

Examples of nameless in a Sentence

She left the hotel with a nameless man in a black jacket.

The source for my story prefers to remain nameless.

A top government official, who shall remain nameless, has expressed concern about the decision.

The men were buried there in nameless graves.

Recent Examples on the Web

Well, the second verse is about him, but the other two men who inspired the song will remain nameless for now. —Shannon Carlin, TIME, 19 Apr. 2024

One current Google employee at the rally, who asked to remain nameless, told Gizmodo that the building’s security asked him and other protestors to leave Google’s office during their sit-in. —Maxwell Zeff / Gizmodo, Quartz, 17 Apr. 2024

Waheed blasts 50 Cent and loves junk food; Marie lives a few floors above her mother; and the narrator, who remains nameless, recounts her struggle with bipolar disorder. —The New Yorker, 15 Apr. 2024

On this day, Downey was Claude, the C.I.A. handler for Xuande’s character, who is known as the Captain, a nameless Communist spy whose undercover assignment leads him to Los Angeles after the fall of Saigon in 1975. —Brandon Yu, New York Times, 12 Apr. 2024

Nguyen asked to be cast as a nameless Vietnamese villager who gets blown up by the inner movie's American heroes, as a symbol for how casually Hollywood treated mangled Asian bodies. —Andrew R. Chow, TIME, 9 Apr. 2024

All around, horses and cows roam in pastures crisscrossed by nameless dirt roads. —Tyrone Beason, Los Angeles Times, 7 Apr. 2024

Image At the center of this novel is a forbidden forest that sits at the northern edge of a nameless town. —Gabino Iglesias, New York Times, 22 Feb. 2024

In this world, though, the voices behind those nameless, chattering avatars get their 15 minutes of internet infamy. —WIRED, 1 Nov. 2023

Word History

First Known Use

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Kids Definition

nameless

adjective

name·​less ˈnām-ləs 

1

: having no name

2

: not marked with a name

a nameless grave

3

: unknown entry 1, anonymous

a nameless hero

4

a

: impossible to describe

nameless fears

b

: too disgusting or disturbing to be described

nameless acts of cruelty