Loose

Part of speech: adjective

Pronunciation: /luːs/

Definitions

1. Not firmly or tightly fixed in place; free from physical restraint or attachment
2. Not tightly held or secured in position ; lacking strictness or precision in rules or standards ; allowed to move or act freely without restriction ; fitting with extra space or slackness
3. Easily detached or able to move around due to lack of tight fastening ; characterized by leniency or looseness in interpretation or enforcement ; released from bonds or constraints ; having a relaxed or roomy fit

Etymology: The adjective "loose" arrived in English from Old Norse, not from the Old English vocabulary that gave us most of our everyday words. Its Middle English form "loos" was borrowed from Old Norse "lauss", meaning free, unfastened or without a bond, and the two languages were close enough that such borrowings often slipped in unnoticed during the centuries of Norse settlement in northern England. The Norse word descends from a Proto-Germanic root, and that root is also the source of the suffix "-less", as in "careless" or "fearless", which once meant something like "free of" or "lacking". Behind both sits the older Indo-European root meaning "to untie, set free, separate", which also produced the Greek ending "-lysis", seen in words like "analysis", where a thing is broken back into its parts. So "loose" and the Greek word for dissolving share a distant ancestor.

Synonyms: slack, free, unbound, unfastened, spacious

Antonyms: tight, secure, fixed, bound, constricted