Flightless

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Unable to fly; describing birds or insects that have lost or never developed the ability to become airborne
2. Incapable of ascending into the air
3. a term used for species that either never evolved the capacity for aerial movement or have lost it through adaptation

Etymology: "Flightless" is a plain compound: the noun "flight" joined to the suffix "-less," which means "without." Its two parts are old and ordinary. "Flight" descends from Old English "flyht," a word for flying or the act of moving through the air, which itself grew from the Germanic root behind "fly." The suffix "-less" comes from Old English "-lēas," meaning "devoid of" or "lacking," and the same suffix appears in words like "careless" and "homeless." Put together, the word literally means "without flight." Its earliest sense is simply a description of an animal that cannot take to the air, so it needed no special invention to describe the ostrich, the kiwi, or the dodo. The word works because English readily builds privative adjectives this way: "flight" plus "-less" describes the absence of the capacity itself.

Synonyms: unable to fly, grounded, non-flying

Antonyms: flying, aviary, soaring