temperless

English

Etymology

temper +‎ -less

Adjective

temperless (comparative more temperless, superlative most temperless)

1. (ceramics) Untempered.
   • 1971, Bulletin: Anthropological series - Issues 87-88, page 6:

     All of the 60 analysable body sherds recovered from the refuse are plain and possess the temperless to slightly tempered paste with clay granule inclusions that characterized the majority of the previously described rim sherds.

   • 2006, Mark A. Rees, Patrick Livingood, Plaquemine Archaeology, page 124:

     It may also be explained aesthetically: Pearl River potters seemed to prefer a more uniform, polished, "temperless" look for serving ware vessels.

   • 2010, Vernon James Knight, H. Edwin Jackson, Susan L. Scott, Mound Excavations at Moundville, page 160:

     Random amorphous bits of fired clay, temperless and not identifiable as wall daub, were frequently encountered in the excavations.

   • 2015, Rosemary A. Joyce, Cerro Palenque: Power and Identity on the Maya Periphery:

     This shift in settlement and impoverishment in material goods took place as the indigenous polychrome style (affiliated with Lowland Maya polychromestyles such as that of Altun Ha) was replaced by temperless, incised ceramics inspired by contemporary western Maya traditions.

2. Showing no passion; impassive.
   • 1887, John Robert Irelan, The Republic:

     However formal and temperless may seem the greater part of the written diplomatic history of a nation, the real facts are often quite different.

   • 1900, Harvey Buxon, Our Remarkable Fledger, page 208:

     ' I always felt you were no gentleman, and this proves it,' remarks the disconsolate yet temperless Ladlaw, as he pockets his cash.

   • 1997, Louis Auchincloss, The Atonement and Other Stories:

     I could now even visualize the son, that impassive, humorless, temperless man, as a kind of lethal vine twisting itself ineluctably around the stout trunk of a venerable oak, or even, more horribly, as a giant anaconda around the body of a strangled steer.

   • 2018, F. Marion Crawford, Pietro Ghisleri, page 59:

     They wander aimlessly about in all directions, a sort of joint sacrifice, perpetually tortured and daily offered up on the altar of the diabolical courier, crushed beneath the ubiquitous Juggernaut hotel-keeper, bound continually in new and arid places to be torn by the vulture guide, and ultimately sent home more or less penniless, quite temperless, and perhaps permanently disgusted with one another and with married life.