adjective
- being without clothing or covering; nude: naked children swimming in the lake.
- without adequate clothing: a naked little beggar.
- bare of any covering, overlying matter, vegetation, foliage, or the like: naked fields.
- bare, stripped, or destitute (usually followed by of): The trees were suddenly naked of leaves.
- without the customary covering, container, or protection: a naked sword; a naked flame.
- without carpets, hangings, or furnishings, as rooms or walls.
- (of the eye, sight, etc.) unassisted by a microscope, telescope, or other instrument: visible to the naked eye.
- defenseless; unprotected; exposed: naked to invaders.
- plain; simple; unadorned: the naked realities of the matter.
- not accompanied or supplemented by anything else: a naked outline of the facts.
- exposed to view or plainly revealed: the naked threat in the letter; a naked vein of coal.
- plain-spoken; blunt: the naked truth.
- Law. unsupported, as by authority or consideration: a naked promise.
- Botany.
- (of seeds) not enclosed in an ovary.
- (of flowers) without a calyx or perianth.
- (of stalks, branches, etc.) without leaves.
- (of stalks, leaves, etc.) without hairs or pubescence.
- Zoology. having no covering of hair, feathers, shell, etc.
adjective
- having the body completely unclothed; undressedCompare bare 1
- having no covering; bare; exposeda naked flame
- with no qualification or concealment; stark; plainthe naked facts
- unaided by any optical instrument, such as a telescope or microscope (esp in the phrase the naked eye)
- with no defence, protection, or shield
- (usually foll by of) stripped or destitutenaked of weapons
- (of the seeds of gymnosperms) not enclosed in a pericarp
- (of flowers) lacking a perianth
- (of stems) lacking leaves and other appendages
- (of animals) lacking hair, feathers, scales, etc
- law
- unsupported by authority or financial or other considerationa naked contract
- lacking some essential condition to render valid; incomplete
adj.Old English nacod “nude, bare; empty,” also “not fully clothed,” from Proto-Germanic *nakwathaz (cf. Old Frisian nakad, Middle Dutch naket, Dutch naakt, Old High German nackot, German nackt, Old Norse nökkviðr, Old Swedish nakuþer, Gothic naqaþs “naked”), from PIE root *nogw- “naked” (cf. Sanskrit nagna, Hittite nekumant-, Old Persian *nagna-, Greek gymnos, Latin nudus, Lithuanian nuogas, Old Church Slavonic nagu-, Russian nagoi, Old Irish nocht, Welsh noeth “bare, naked”). Related: Nakedly; nakedness. Applied to qualities, actions, etc., from late 14c. (first in “The Cloud of Unknowing”); phrase naked truth is from 1585, in Alexander Montgomerie’s “The Cherry and the Slae”: Which thou must (though it grieve thee) grantI trumped never a man.But truely told the naked trueth,To men that meld with mee,For neither rigour, nor for rueth,But onely loath to lie.[Montgomerie, 1585] Phrase naked as a jaybird (1943) was earlier naked as a robin (1879, in a Shropshire context); the earliest known comparative based on it was naked as a needle (late 14c.). Naked eye is from 1660s, unnecessary in the world before telescopes and microscopes.
- Zoology Lacking outer covering such as scales, fur, feathers, or a shell.
- Botany
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- Lacking a pericarp, as the seeds of the pine.
- Lacking a perianth, as the flowers of spurge.
- Unprotected by scales, as a bud.
- Having no leaves, as a branch or stem.
- Having no covering of fine, hairlike structures, as a stalk or leaf; glabrous.